Every morning, someone in public works decides who goes where. In many cities that's a whiteboard, a stack of printouts and local knowledge. It works, but it's slow, and it's hard when the person who knows the streets is out sick.
Sentra 311's Dispatch screen does the routine part: split the jobs between workers and put each list in a sensible driving order. The dispatcher still makes the calls.
Planning a day
The dispatcher opens Dispatch in the portal and picks:
- The date.
- The workers. One or several.
- The jobs. Choose from the open queue with filters, or type numbers like "1, 5, 8."
- A start point. The default is the center of the city limits. The dispatcher can search an address, such as the corporation yard, or click the map.
Sentra 311 then proposes a plan.
How the split works
Jobs are split between the selected workers by area, so each worker gets a cluster of nearby jobs instead of crossing town. Each worker's stops are then put in order by drive time along real streets, not straight-line distance.
The map shows each worker's route in its own color, with numbered stops and the actual street path. Totals show stops, kilometers and estimated driving time for each worker.
Adjusting the plan
The plan is a starting point. The dispatcher can:
- Drag stops to reorder them, or use up and down buttons from the keyboard.
- Move a job to another worker.
- Remove a job.
- Press "Best order" to re-optimize after changes.
When it looks right, Confirm assigns each request to its worker and saves the route for the day. Assignment uses the same rules as anywhere else in the system, so timelines and notifications stay correct.
Print or phone
Printed route sheets have one page per worker, with stops in order, the address and type of each job, driving distance and time per leg, and a directions link for each stop and the whole route. Some crews like paper in the truck.
The worker app shows "My route today" on the home screen. The worker sees the next stop with a Navigate button that opens their phone's maps app, the full route on a map, and the list of stops. Tapping a stop opens the job.
Street routing
Routes and drive times come from a street routing service. Sentra 311 supports Mapbox, and falls back to OpenStreetMap-based routing (OSRM) if Mapbox isn't configured or can't be reached. If no routing is available, it still works with straight-line estimates, clearly marked as estimates. Routes are cached, so planning the same day twice doesn't cost twice.
What it doesn't do
Dispatch doesn't take crews' skills, equipment or shift lengths into account yet. A dispatcher still decides that the pothole truck isn't the right truck for a sign. Returning to the yard at the end of the day and per-department yard addresses are on our list.
Example: three workers, twelve jobs
Say Streets has twelve open jobs on a Tuesday and three workers. The dispatcher selects the three workers, filters the queue to Streets, selects all twelve and sets the start point to the corporation yard.
Sentra 311 groups the jobs into three clusters, one in the north end, one downtown and one on the east side, and orders each by drive time from the yard. The map shows three colored routes. The dispatcher notices one downtown job needs the larger truck, moves it to the worker who has it and presses "Best order." Confirm, print three sheets, done.
The whole plan takes a few minutes, and it's on screen for whoever covers dispatch on a day off.
Seeing the results
After the routes are worked, the worker efficiency report shows each worker's travel time and time on site, and the route on a map for each day.
Why it's worth it
The obvious benefit is less driving. The less obvious one is consistency. When the plan is on a screen, anyone can run dispatch on the day the usual dispatcher is out, and supervisors can see who was sent where.
It also feeds worker efficiency reporting, which shows travel time and time on site, so you can see whether routes are getting better over time.