Stormwater Management Urged In Wake Of Hurricane Helene
Turf Editors
Mowing Equipment Feature: Adding Mowers To Your Fleet?
Spring mowing season is here and whether you’re just starting to build a fleet or in the process of replacing aging equipment, there are more commercial mower options now than ever before. We spoke with some resources in the power equipment industry to sort through models and power sources to find out what’s the ideal piece for your needs and—most importantly—your budget. “There is an extraordinarily diverse field of products at price point and power source today,” says Kris Kiser, president and CEO of the Outdoor Power Equipment Institute (OPEI), the equipment manufacturers’ trade association. “And it continues to evolve.” According to Kiser, the focus is increasingly on safety and comfort for equipment operators. “Manufacturers have gotten way smarter about helping people use their machines for eight hours a day,” he said. “Most landscape professionals have a ‘lane’ that they stay in,” says Tom Vachal, senior turf product manager for Kubota. Whether that’s wide open spaces (think: golf courses and baseball fields), tighter municipal areas, or somewhere in between —a mix of smaller yards and commercial properties—there are mowers to help optimize comfort, productivity and durability, he said. Wide Open Spaces For landscapers who are maintaining larger properties, like golf courses, sports fields, or college campuses, the obvious choice is a wide deck zero turn that you can just get on and go. For the larger commercial areas, “you’re going to want to optimize your speed and efficiency,” says George Reister, global product manager for Husqvarna who has over 20 ...
OPEI Expands Product Representation, Adds Golf Cars And Light Transport Vehicles
The Outdoor Power Equipment Institute (OPEI) has announced that the International Light Transportation Vehicle Association (ILTVA) has transferred representation of its member products and respective ANSI standards to OPEI, effective January 1, 2019. This expands OPEI’s product representation to now include golf cars and light transport vehicles. “OPEI is a natural fit for these products as we actively represent a wide range of utility vehicles currently in the marketplace,” says Kris Kiser, President of OPEI. “As the association of record in this space, we’re a leader in the development of safety standards for UTVs, and have significant experience as it relates to these vehicles with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and other regulators.” OPEI currently represents manufacturers of utility vehicles for a wide range of end-user applications. ILTVA developed and maintained ANSI standards relating to the design and performance of golf cars and personal transport vehicles. That organization will wind down its operations, and those standards will now be part of OPEI’s ongoing standards development work. “As uses and applications of these products have expanded, it made sense for us to partner with OPEI. The association has a demonstrable history in utility vehicle safety and performance standards and representing these products before regulatory authorities, as well as a deep background in market statistics collection, and positions us well as we look toward the industry’s future,” says Mark Wagner, member, OPEI Board of Directors, and President and CEO of Club Car, LLC, Ingersoll-Rand Industrial Technologies. “We’re excited to work with ...
