Salem Street Department Operators Mike Logan, right, and Collin Murphy are prepared to have the city’s salt trucks ready for service as soon as the need arises this winter season. (Photo by Morgan Ahart)
SALEM — The Salem Street Department is fully stocked and ready to meet the city’s winter weather needs.
Treating 57 linear miles of roadways and an additional 30 linear miles of alleyways, the Salem Street Department treats roads with pure salt in all but the most severe of conditions, eschewing the use of grit common amidst most local municipalities. Street Foreman Shawn Smith explained that typically the department will only make use of grit in extreme cold weather conditions when salt will not melt ice sufficiently to ensure traction for vehicle.
Smith said that treating with pure salt has a number of benefits, staying on the road longer, and requiring less need for street sweeping in spring. Smith also said that the pure-salt treatments also cause less wear on city roads. Smith explained that although the initial expense of pure-salt treatment is higher, these advantages typically save the city money on its winter weather response in the long term.
However, that increased up-front expense won’t prove an issue for the city this year. Smith said that he estimated that department currently had a stockpile of roughly 2,200 tons of salt on hand, and that the department hadn’t needed to purchase any salt this year due to the low amount of material required for treatment during last year’s mild winter.
“We didn’t really have much of a winter last year, so we didn’t really use much salt,” said Smith.
Smith estimated the department used roughly 1,200 tons of salt last winter, which he said represented only about half of the amount that the city ordered last year. Smith explained that the process for ordering salt, which sees municipalities place their orders in the spring before the price for the year is known requires the city to take a certain amount of that salt regardless of need, or face penalties on the next year’s order.
“To an extent we have to make our best educated guesses on what the weather’s going to be when we’re placing our orders,” said Smith.
Smith joked that while the city had been able to store all the salt it ordered last year, “every single inch” of the department’s storage buildings had been completely filled with salt.
The department has four large plow trucks, as well as four medium sized trucks to be deployed to clear the main roadways in addition to a pickup truck which can be fitted with a salt dispenser and plow to make use of that stockpiled material. Smith said that while the department does not typically pre-treat, when reports of severe weather are received, he and the rest of the department’s employees will typically “try to come in early and get ahead of the storm.”
Smith also said that the department works very closely with the Salem Police Department, whose officers “are always on the road” and will contact the department if road conditions begin to deteriorate, helping the department to remain ahead of any potentially dangerous roadway conditions.
“The police really do help us out a lot with keeping everyone safe this time of year,” said Smith.
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