COLORADO SPRINGS — Colorado Springs' Public Works Operations and Maintenance Division Manager Corey Farkas says it was too warm to pre-treat the roads prior to Monday's storm.
"If it is warm, and you put that down prior to the snow starting to fall, you'll hit a humidity level that will make that liquid de-icer that you had pre treated with an ice rink before the ice even starts to form," Farkas said.
Coloradans like to say: if it snows today, the sun will melt it by tomorrow, but after Monday, the white stuff was here to stay.
“There were cars sliding left and right," said Ed Colt. “The main roads were fine but you got to be careful on the side roads.”
“A lot of the backroads in certain areas are a little bit rough," said Tanya Lowe.
The main roads, like Woodmen, were in good shape. The city says it treats snow on those first: roads we all use to get to work, go to the store, and roads that lead to hospitals.
Just a few blocks over, Delmonico is a secondary snow route. You can find a lot of schools along these roads, and the city says it takes care of these next.
But for your more residential, neighborhood roads, it has to snow at least six inches for the city to plow these.
“Getting into all the residential roadways takes quite a few resources, takes time and resources to get in there,” Farkas said. “The primaries and secondaries have to be plowed and passable and treated before we would ever get into those residential roadways.”
A reason for plows avoiding those residential streets: Farkas says they don’t cut.
"Our plows don't cut," he said. "They only float on the roadway, so they're designed to lightly scrape loose material off the top of the roadway, so they can't cut into snow pack and ice, and so getting into those residential roadways is very difficult after the primaries and secondaries are plowed."
___
Local towing company received at least double the number of calls during winter weather
A local towing company has received at least double the amount of phone calls Monday because of the winter storm.
____
Watch KOAA News5 on your time, anytime with our free streaming app available for your Roku, FireTV, AppleTV and Android TV. Just search KOAA News5, download and start watching.
