Fayetteville Gets An Early Start On Snow Preparation

FAYETTEVILLE -- It's the middle of summer, but the city Transportation Division is gearing up for winter weather.

The city will use a $34,500 General Improvement Fund grant facilitated by state Rep. Charlie Collins, R-Fayetteville, to buy two snowplow blades and various mechanical parts needed for snow removal.

Transportation Division workers are also restocking salt supply, and they've included plans for a $400,000 winter weather operations center in a five-year capital improvement plan the City Council will consider Tuesday.

All of the efforts are intended to combat weather such as the 2009 ice storm, the record 17 inches of snow in February 2011 and the flurry of snow and ice storms that swept through Northwest Arkansas last winter.

"It seems like there's been more to deal with lately," Terry Gulley, Transportation Services director, said Thursday. "We're better suited right now for more of it."

The city has eight or nine plows that can can be attached to the front of trucks. Another truck can be loaded with a belly plow, which uses the weight of the truck to scrape ice from street surfaces. The city's road grader can be used, too.

The Transportation Division blew through its 500-ton stockpile of crushed rock salt after the second storm of the season in December, Gulley said. That left officials searching for salt at a time when highway departments and other municipalities throughout the country were doing the same thing.

Salt, calcium chloride and beet juice are spread on city streets, or mixed into brine to thaw ice and snow. Grit and sand are used to improve traction on the streets

The city spent $218,162 on snow removal material last winter, according to the General Improvement Fund grant application.

Collins earlier this year suggested the city apply for the grant distributed by the Northwest Arkansas Economic Development District.

"The winter that we had was a very difficult and expensive one, particularly for municipalities that had to pay for excessive snow and ice removal," Collins said Thursday. "In my view, having the state assist cities in having to deal with that ... is important."

Aside from the replacement blades and parts the grant will pay for, Transportation Division workers solicited bids for crushed rock salt earlier in the year than normal.

Aldermen are set to approve an agreement with Central Salt of St. Louis to pay $106.16 per ton for salt as needed.

Gulley said it will be at least a year before the winter weather operations center is built.

The covered structure on the north side of the fleet building will give workers a place to mix material, store equipment, load trucks and hold more than triple the amount of chemicals they are able to store in a secure, dry location.

The $400,000 expenditure also will go toward equipping trucks with global positioning system devices so workers can better coordinate snow removal. The system will give supervisors the ability to track which streets have been treated -- and when -- rather than relying solely on radio communication.

"As we treat a road, it will turn the street red on a map," Gulley said.