- Priority spots for ACHD are main roadways, bridge overpasses, railroad and school crossings, and areas near hospitals and fire stations
(Below is the transcript from the broadcast story)
Once snow hits the ground and sticks to the pavement roads can get a bit slippery.
I'm your neighborhood reporter Jessica Davis reporting from the Boise Bench, and crews with the Ada County Highway District are going out day and night to make sure that roads are safe to travel on.
"We have over 5,300 land miles of roadway, so with that, we have to imply priority system to attack it,” says Jennifer Berenger, Deputy Director of Maintenance for the Ada County Highway District
ACHD has a lot of tools when clearing the roads. They use snow plows to move snow off the road, magnesium chloride, that is used as an anti-icer, sand, and salt, or a mix of both, that helps with traction.
Berenger says, "If you have any accumulation on the ground of ice and snow then you have to give the material time to work. So you might be driving down the road and have snowpack or some areas of the ice. We've probably been through and we're waiting for that to break the bond for the next rotation where we can scrape it off the road.”
We often see warmer temperatures after snowfall allowing the snow to melt off, but this snow could stick around longer than usual.
Idaho News 6 Chief Meteorologist Scott Dorval says we can see ice on the road for days.
Scott says, “When the snow stops we're probably going to get an inversion and that's gonna keep things frozen solid probably for some time to come. So whatever is happening in the secondary roadways is probably going to stick around for maybe another five days at least if not longer.”
ACHD is under 24-hour rotation this weekend or until the active storm has passed. Their priority spots are main roadways, bridge overpasses, railroad and school crossings, and areas near hospitals and fire stations as for neighborhoods.
"Once we get through our priority ones, part of what we do in our priority twos is the school bus routes which cover some of those neighborhoods roads and then, in addition, we start getting into the secondary intersections and the stop signs in the neighborhood,” says Berenger.
Also, Sunday morning when the snow is over is probably a good time to shovel your driveway, because it's not going to melt on its own.
ACHD advises drivers to drive with caution if they have to travel this weekend and keep an emergency kit in the backseat of their car in case of emergencies.
