ODOT Gearing Up For Winter Weather

As win­ter gets closer and closer, the Ohio Depart­ment of Trans­porta­tion garage in Mont­pe­lier this year, plans to use some inno­v­a­tive new approaches this year. Accord­ing to the Bryan Times, cal­cium chlo­ride will be deployed from one of the district’s 14 trucks if it gets really cold out­side and the ice starts bond­ing to the road. That’s because the cal­cium starts work­ing at a cooler tem­per­a­ture than salt brine will. ODOT dri­vers this year, will be using inno­v­a­tive prac­tices based off obser­va­tion and exper­i­men­ta­tion. An 87 per­cent salt liq­uid solu­tion they say, has great advan­tages over stan­dard dry salt. The brine helps the salt to react and start work­ing quicker. Since, it’s a com­bi­na­tion of liq­uid and salt that’s going down, it’s already react­ing as soon as it hits the ground. High­way offi­cials say often they use a pre-wet before the storm comes or in a frost sit­u­a­tion for bridges. One of the main rea­sons the brine mix­ture is becom­ing more reg­u­larly used by ODOT, is that it’s cheaper, and it reduces salt con­sump­tion by up to 30 per­cent. The City of Bryan, accord­ing to the Times, already pur­chases the brine mix­ture from ODOT.