When it comes to the maintenance and upkeep of critical infrastructure throughout the United States—i.e. roads, bridges, highways, rail lines, etc.—private and public agencies face huge workloads each day. Recent studies found over 54,000 bridges in need of repair across the U.S. alone. And the fact that there exist approximately 137,000 route miles of the rail network and 4,071,000 miles of roads across the country, all of which require consistent maintenance and upkeep, further highlights the importance of this work.
But the emergence of drone technology has helped many Departments of Transportation (DOTs) tackle the ever-increasing demands of infrastructure maintenance. Here are five reasons why infrastructure inspection drones are the future of civil infrastructure.
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