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The City of Palo Alto is the only city in California that owns and operates six utility services. The history of Palo Alto is unique in the sense that the city stood strong on the belief it could deliver utility services at lower rates than private companies. The main goal of owning and operating its utilities was to show a financial return and in the last fiscal year the utilities provided millions in support to community services from parks to libraries. Another priority to the city is pedestrian safety, especially when it comes to access hatches that are used for housing underground utilities. Diamond plate was often used for these access hatch covers. This proved to be an unsatisfactory choice, especially when the surfaces became wet. There were several access hatch covers that needed to be replaced throughout the city. Palo Alto decided to invest in a longer term solution for increasing public safety and minimizing the city’s liability exposure by choosing a more slip resistant surface.

SlipNOT® has been a supplier of non skid access hatches for municipalities throughout California and other states for decades. Due to the unmatched surface hardness, bond strength and longevity SlipNOT® provides, it continues to be the first choice for the City of Palo Alto when renovating their existing access hatches covers. For this project SlipNOT® provided several 3/8” x 32-1/2” x 50 ½” galvanized steel non skid access hatch covers with pick and bolt holes to meet the specifications. In addition, SlipNOT® used stencils to add the required identification logos of “CPA Communications” and “ CPA Electric”.

The City of Palo Alto continues to be happy with the inimitable performance of SlipNOT® access hatch covers. SlipNOT® galvanized steel access hatches provide long term slip resistance due to the extremely high bond strength and file-hard surface hardness of the patented SlipNOT® process. The unparalleled SlipNOT® surface provides long-term safety to pedestrians throughout Palo Alto in all weather conditions.