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Road conditions on 511 Wisconsin are calculated using weather and pavement computer models. Weather and road conditions change rapidly, and the information reported via 511 Wisconsin should not be used as the only factor in determining whether to travel. The Wisconsin Department of Transportation advises travelers to use various resources (radio, television, weather apps, etc.) to make an informed decision before you travel. Motorists are cautioned to be alert to changing circumstances and adjust their driving accordingly.

Always putting safety first, never access 511 information while driving. Please dial 911 to report an emergency situation.

Using 511WI

Welcome to Wisconsin 511. There are many features available for you to plan your trip before you go. You don’t need to sign up for a My 511 account in order to use many of the features available. If you want to receive alerts about roadwork or incidents on routes you regularly travel, then you will need to sign up and create a My 511 account.

Here are some of the features available to you, even if you don’t sign up for an account:

1. View winter road conditions, traffic speed data, road cameras, weather alerts and forecasts, and Waze events. You can select what information you want to appear on the map by checking and unchecking the boxes on the Map Legend on the right side of the screen. You can click on any of the icons on the map to view more information. When the winter road conditions box is checked, you can also click on any road segment to view detailed information about conditions.
2. Use the route planner to view your estimated travel time and any traffic events along your route. (Note: if you sign up and create a My 511 account, you can receive notifications on your saved routes.)
3. View winter road conditions, traffic, waze reports, message signs, cameras and travel times in a list that you can filter and search. Access the list views by clicking on the Traffic dropdown menu on upper-right side of your screen.

Signing up with 511WI

1. Visit 511WI and select ‘Sign Up’ from the menu options.
2. Enter your name, email, and create a password. Click ‘Sign Up’ when done.
3. Verify your account by following the link that was sent to your email.
4. If you signed up with a phone number, you will also receive an SMS (text) with your confirmation code. Please note that this is only to confirm your mobile number for receiving text alerts and that you must first sign up your account before you can verify your phone number. You can verify your phone number here.

Creating & Saving a Customized Route

1. Sign in to 511WI
2. Enter your start and end locations by typing the addresses into the address fields. Alternatively, you may also right click on the map, select a location from the available options, and select whether the location will be the start or end of your trip. Once you have entered the route locations, click ‘Drive’.
3. Review the routes generated and select the one that suits you best. If none of the routes provided are satisfactory, you can select the route on the map and drag it accordingly.
4. When done, enter a name for your route and click ‘Save’. You will be presented with the option to create an alert for the route you just created.

Creating a Notification for your Route

1. Sign in to 511WI
2. In the Manage My Routes table, find the route that you previously saved that you would like to create an alert for and click ‘Create Route Notification’.
3. A route notification modal will popup with the default notification settings for your route. Click ‘Save’ if you wish to use these default settings.
4. If you wish to change the default settings, press ‘Edit’ and proceed to the Manage Notification page.
   • Note, Routing may not include all road construction, traffic incident or weather event closures.

Always putting safety first, never access 511 information while driving.

Creating Alert Notification

1. Sign in to 511WI
2. In the Manage My Alerts table, select ‘Create Alert Notification’.
3. Fill the required fields and click ‘Subscribe to Emergency Alert’.

Note: Emergency Alerts are any major incident in Wisconsin, whereas alerts you create are events that affect your saved routes.

Creating a Temporary Route

1. Go to the 511 Wisconsin homepage.
2. Click on the ‘My Routes’ tab if it is not already highlighted.
3. Insert your current location address  into section A and insert the desired travel location address into section B.
4. Click on ‘Drive’ if you have a personal vehicle or ‘Transit’ if you are using public transportation.
5. The route is now created.
   *Note that you may have multiple routes to choose from

Accessing the Traffic Camera Feature on the Map

1. Check the ‘Cameras’ box on the Map Legend.
2. Click on any of the camera icons that appear on the map.
3. View the traffic camera in real-time.

Searching for a Specific Traffic Camera

1. Hover over the ‘Traffic’ tab at the top of the homepage and click on ‘Camera List’ in the drop down menu.
2. Navigate the camera list with the search box or scroll down the camera list and click one of the highlighted streets.
3. After clicking on the desired camera, it will then appear on the map *Note if you cannot find a camera on our list or in the search box we may not have
   one in that specific location.

Using the Map's New Weather Feature

1. Check the ‘Weather Alerts’ and/or ‘Weather Forecasts’ box on the Map Legend.
2. Click on any of the weather icons that appear on the map.
3. View weather information or alerts in real-time.

Setting Map Legend

1. Sign in to 511WI.
2. Simply select the information you would like displayed by default on the map.
3. Click ‘Save’ when done.

Saving & Editing Cameras

1. Sign in to 511WI
2. Select the cameras checkbox in the map legend.
3. Select a camera by clicking the camera icon and click ‘My Cameras’ button.  Select the camera view you want the camera to be added to.  Create a custom camera view by clicking ‘New Camera View’.
4. To view and edit your saved cameras, go to My Cameras.
5. In Manage My Cameras page, click on the ‘Manage Camera Views’ to add, modify or delete a camera view.
6. To enter a custom nickname for your saved camera, simply type your desired nickname into the camera nickname field.

Setting Default Map Open Location

1. Sign in to 511WI
2. From the Home Page, select the region you are interested in from the Regions Drop Down, located just to the right of ‘Log Off.’
3. Each time you come back to the 511WI site, you will be brought to this map location.
   • If you clear your browser's cookies, this process will have to be performed again.
   • If you do not log into your My 511WI account and change the region, you will be brought to the newly changed region each time you return to the 511WI site.  If you log back in to your My 511WI account, however, you will be brought back to the location chosen at the beginning of this process.

Roadwork / Trucker Information Map Layer Overlap

1. When loading both the Roadwork and Trucker Information, the last layer selected will overlap the first.
   • For instance, if the Roadwork Layer was activated first, then the Trucker Information is activated second, the Trucker Layer will overlap the Roadwork layer and that data will not be available until the Trucker Information Layer is deactivated.

Modifying Route to Avoid Closure

Click on the route segment near the closure and drag the waypoint away from the closure.  More than one waypoint may be needed to avoid the closure.