Montgomery County prepares for snow; Over 300 snow equipment will be ready for snow removal

Tosin Fakile
·2 min read
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MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Md. (DC News Now) — Several transportation departments across the DMV got a 24-hour head start on the roads before the snow that is expected on Friday night.

Montgomery County’s Department of Transportation (MCDOT) said it had crews out on Thursday evening pre-treating miles of road in the county with salt brine.

“We went out and treated 1,300 miles of our network with salt brine. About 9,000 gallons of Salt Brine, it took us maybe 9 hours to provide that treatment to the network, said Richard Dorsey, MCDOT Highway Division Chief.

Once the winter weather begins Friday night, officials said they’ll have about 320 pieces of equipment activated to clear the roads.

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Dorsey said in Montgomery County some of the primary roads they get to first are roads like Shady Grove, Democracy Boulevard, Mid County Highway and Randolph Road.

“And those are the roads we keep in the best shape possible during these emergency events to make sure our first responders can get to the communities they need to serve,” said Dorsey

Dorsey said they have the capability to store 80,000 tons of salt. Currently, they have 55,000 tons of salt but they hope they won’t have to use it all.

The plan is to have crews activated at about the same time the snow event is expected to begin on Friday night.

“We’re going to activate at 10 p.m. tonight and we’ll monitor the conditions and treat as necessary. Actually, this storm is a prime time event because the timing…gives us space to address pavement conditions without the traffic volumes,” Dorsey said.

“We’ll have our storm operation center activated and so we’ll be able to communicate with the emergency entities within Montgomery County and our crews on the streets,” Dorsey said.

Dorsey is reminding drivers to be mindful of snow teams when they are out treating the roads. He said drivers should give the snow teams some space so they can make the roads safe.

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