"A perfect example of Seattle road care being defective by design." --aspasia13

[dolari]

Courtesy aspasia13, here's whjy Seattle area roads are a mess, and why it would be so !@($!@ easy to fix if they'd just use...well, you'll see.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008551284_snowcleanup23m.html:

Seattle refuses to use salt; roads "snow packed" by design
Seattle's strategy for clearing roads relies on sand and de-icer, not salt, which is a more effective method of melting ice and snow.

By Susan Kelleher
Seattle Times consumer affairs reporter

To hear the city's spin, Seattle's road crews are making "great progress" in clearing the ice-caked streets.

But it turns out "plowed streets" in Seattle actually means "snow-packed," as in there's snow and ice left on major arterials by design.

"We're trying to create a hard-packed surface," said Alex Wiggins, chief of staff for the Seattle Department of Transportation. "It doesn't look like anything you'd find in Chicago or New York."

The city's approach means crews clear the roads enough for all-wheel and four-wheel-drive vehicles, or those with front-wheel drive cars as long as they are using chains, Wiggins said.

The icy streets are the result of Seattle's refusal to use salt, an effective ice-buster used by the state Department of Transportation and cities accustomed to dealing with heavy winter snows.

"If we were using salt, you'd see patches of bare road because salt is very effective," Wiggins said. "We decided not to utilize salt because it's not a healthy addition to Puget Sound."

By ruling out salt and some of the chemicals routinely used by snowbound cities, Seattle has embraced a less-effective strategy for clearing roads, namely sand sprinkled on top of snowpack along major arterials, and a chemical de-icer that is effective when temperatures are below 32 degrees.

Seattle also equips its plows with rubber-edged blades. That minimizes the damage to roads and manhole covers, but it doesn't scrape off the ice, Wiggins said.

That leaves many drivers, including Seattle police, pretty much on their own until nature does to the snow what the sand can't: melt it.

The city's patrol cars are rear-wheel drive. And even with tire chains, officers are avoiding hills and responding on foot, according to a West Precinct officer.

Between Thursday and Monday, the city spread about 6,000 tons of sand on 1,531 miles of streets it considers major arterials.

The tonnage, sprinkled atop the packed snow, amounts to 1.4 pounds of sand per linear foot of roadway, an amount one expert said might be too little to provide effective traction.

"Hmmm. Six thousand tons of sand for that length of road doesn't seem like it's enough," said Diane Spector, a water-resources planner for Wenck Associates, which evaluated snow and ice clearance for nine cities in the Midwest.

Spector and snow-control experts in four cities said sand is typically mixed with salt and used for trouble spots.

"The occasional application of salt is probably not going to have a lasting effect" on the environment, Spector said. But she cautioned it's highly dependent on where it's used, how often and how much is applied.

Seattle's stand against using salt is not shared by the state Department of Transportation, which has battled the latest storms in Western Washington with de-icer, 5,800 tons of salt and 11,500 cubic yards of salt and sand mix, said spokesman Travis Phelps.

Many cities are moving away from sand because it clogs the sewers, runs into waterways, creates air pollution and costs more to clean up.

Its main attraction is that it typically costs less than one-fifth the price of salt, according to Spector.

"We never use sand," said Ann Williams, spokeswoman for Denver's Department of Public Works. "Sand causes dust, and there's also water-quality issues where it goes into streets and into our rivers."

Instead, it sprays an "anti-icing" agent on dry roads before the snow falls and then a combination of chemicals to melt the ice.

Cheryl Kuck, spokeswoman for the Portland Bureau of Transportation, said her city prepared the streets last week with the "anti-icing" spray. Once the snow started, Portland used chemical de-icers, followed by plowing with 55 plows and treating trouble spots with sand and gravel.

Although the city had plowed 29 of its 36 major routes, "nothing is clear," Kuck said late Monday afternoon. "This is a difficult and challenging situation that's going to take us a long time to recover from."

Wiggins, of Seattle's transportation department, said the city's 27 trucks had plowed and sanded 100 percent of Seattle's main roads, and were going back for second and third passes.

"It's tough going. I won't argue with you on that," he said. But here in Seattle, "we're sensitive about everything we do that impacts the environment."

There's environmental impact, then there's WE'RE GOING TO DIE WHEN WE DRIVE OFF A CLIFF BECAUSE THE SAND HAS BLOWN OFF THE HARD PACKED ROAD. I think the Puget Sound can handle some salt right now...just dont' use it EVERY winter...this is really a crazy winter for Washington (or as they call it in Pennsylvania, "Wednesday.")

Comments

[emilydm.livejournal.com]

Didn't someone in that article's comments calculate that to change the salinity of Puget Sound by any appreciable level, they'd have to empty a tandem dump truck of salt on every linear foot of road in Seattle?

[elenderel.livejournal.com]

I've tried really hard to stay quiet about this because yes, I live in Snowland USA (just got two feet of snow last night and it was up to my knees this morning) ... but reading that article had me agog, jaw-dropped.




"We're trying to create a hard-packed surface," said Alex Wiggins, chief of staff for the Seattle Department of Transportation. "It doesn't look like anything you'd find in Chicago or New York."

Damn straight it doesn't ... because those are two cities that know how to handle snow and ice: You put some salt down and plow with massive metal blades. Tiny towns from Pennsylvania to Canada know this almost instinctively.

The city's approach means crews clear the roads enough for all-wheel and four-wheel-drive vehicles, or those with front-wheel drive cars as long as they are using chains, Wiggins said.

Pardon my French, but WTF is THAT all about. IMO no one should have to use chains unless they live up in God's country; the worst they should need to have in civilization (where the roads should be salted and plowed with metal blades) is studded tires. I have driven on ice and several feet of snow with nothing better than snow tires ... I wonder how many people out there have decent snow tires on their cars. That's probably half the problem-?


Wiggins, of Seattle's transportation department, said the city's 27 trucks had plowed and sanded 100 percent of Seattle's main roads, and were going back for second and third passes.

But there are some pretty steep hills. Around here, steep hills means steady wind ... how much of the sand is actually sticking?


"It's tough going. I won't argue with you on that," he said. But here in Seattle, "we're sensitive about everything we do that impacts the environment."

Impacts the environment?! I thought the Puget Sound was salt water. Salting the roads once per decade is not going to make all the fishies go belly-up. Out here in Snowland, we start salting before it starts snowing in order to start the process of keeping the roads passable; we salt throughout a snow event; we salt afterwards just to make sure. Been doing it that way for decades. And Lake Ontario hasn't turned into an inland salt water sea. Besides, what about air pollution from all the people who are taking longer alternate routes to get to work (if they can get on the roads at all)?

Sorry ... but like I said I've been holding back on commenting. The floodgates have opened ... I'll go back to quietly lurking again.

But sheesh. Seattle - there's a better way!

[ghostangel.livejournal.com]

Let me just say: YOU"RE DOING IT WRONG SEATTLE!

Also, about the salt, a little bit is VERY effective, and if you don't continue to use it all winter, probably WAY safer than the fucking chemical that you're pouring on the roads to your precious Puget Sound! *seethes*

[zaecus.livejournal.com]

*gape*

Seriously?

There being cheap and trying to use _bad_ eco-rhetoric to cover it? What did they spend the money on?

For a while now, the concern over the oceans has been the steadily _lowering_ salinity. if Seattle dumps salt on the roads and that raises Puget's salinity, it would probably -improve- the health of the coast.

[mundanecircus.livejournal.com]

Is it just me, or is the Seattle road department (maybe also the King County road department and WSDOT) mental? While Seattle seldom gets snow, the roads get slick enough, and sand ain't going to help.

The midwest and the northeast are well-prepared for winter. Even Atlanta, though not as prepared as up north, know what to do if snow or ice hits the southeast. using "environmentally-friendly" solutions in tough winter weather is like sacrificing a human to save a whale. What's happening in Seattle is no longer an environmental issue -- it's a safety issue, and no doubt many Seattlites had enough.

[senselessviolnz.livejournal.com]

Not that surprising, really. The death toll for environnmentalists is in the millions; a few more crashed cars isn't gonna deter them.