Road Condition Updates, What to Expect

My message about road conditions: how we got here and what to expect

I’ll level with you. The current condition of our streets in Madison is very frustrating. The snow cap on the street pavement puts residents in a position they shouldn’t have to be in when trying to get around the City. Nearly a week after the last severe winter storm, drivers still need to drive very slowly to avoid sliding or losing control and they can’t see traffic/turn lane markings; Metro Transit busses are still running behind at times and are sliding around and spinning their wheels at bus stops; pedestrians are still crossing large snow build-ups at crossings and can’t see marked crosswalks on the snow-covered street pavement. I’ve seen each of these issues for myself this week and many of you have written about them.

I’m writing this update to share more information about what lead us to this point and to share what you can expect the roads to look like over the next few days as temperatures rise back to the range where salt can melt pavement snow on the salt routes. Below my own words in this post, I’ve pasted an update that the Streets Division Superintendent shared with alders today for your reference. I bolded some of his phrases for emphasis based on what I thought is most important for you to know right now.

I’ve learned more about snow plowing, ice melting, and pavement management in the last week than I ever thought I’d need to know. Some folks are sharing frustration that the City’s road-salting policy alone caused the snow cap on or busy roads. I’m telling you now that the road salting policy is not the only factor here. The severity of this particular pattern of weather is important to understand, too: we had a 13-inch snowstorm last Friday; gusting winds blew snow around all day last Saturday; Saturday night into Sunday saw another 1.5 inches of fresh snow; and then the Saturday-into-Sunday frigid temperatures lower than when road salt can met snow. The Streets Division folks tell me we haven’t seen since winter of 2018-19, and in that case, the cold spell following snowfall (and the resulting snow cap on our City streets) only lasted 3 or 4 days, far shorter than the 8 days of frigid temps this year. Understandably, given that we all had the same snowstorm and frigid cold conditions, you might be wondering why other neighboring municipalities appear to have clearer streets than we Madison residents do right now. 

Charles Romines’ post below includes more information about the Streets Division’s decision-making process around more rounds of salt being added to roads as snow fell last Friday. They needed to avoid the possibility that early salt applications during the storm, without enough repeated salt applications throughout the storm to keep up with snowfall, may have resulted in a layer of melted slush on the pavement that then froze into an ice sheet on our busiest roads as temperatures fell on Saturday. See his text lower in this post for that information about that. For my part, I think we need to revisit Madison’s salting policy to make sure that it’s not holding us back from salting the salt routes during snow storms when those snow storms are followed by extended periods of time when those extended cold temperatures make salt ineffective. If we can clear the busiest streets sooner without dramatically increasing our costs, I think we need to try.

This is also a budget issue for Madison: the current size of our snow plow fleet and Streets Division staffing who drive the snow plows were not sufficient to keep up with the speed of snowfall in this particular storm if we wanted to maintain clear pavement, given the tight timeframe before frigid temperatures set in that made road salt ineffective. I supported the City's Public Works agencies' (including the Streets Division) capital budget and operating budget requests in the 2024 City Budget and I will continue to do so in future budgets because I view road safety as a major public safety issue. 

Unlike other snow-plowing agencies, Dane County Highway Department for example, the Madison Streets Division staff still had to collect Madison residents’ trash/recycling most days last week and this week, with the smallest service disruption possible. The same folks who plow the roads also pick up our residents’ trash/recycling. The worse-than-usual snowfall followed by frigid temperatures, paired with the competing work priorities and limited size of our Streets Division staff and fleet, meant that post-storm salting of our salt routes was insufficient to clear the roadways while temperatures still allowed salt to work. As vehicles drove over the snow, they pushed it down into a solid snow cap that can't easily be scraped up. 

Temperatures this coming Sunday and thereafter will exceed the point when road salt is effective at melting snow and ice, which is going to make a big, slushy mess. As the snow cap on our streets melts, tire ruts and jagged edges will and will need to be plowed off the streets before they freeze overnight to avoid a new layer of ice on the pavement Sunday night or Monday night. That means we can expect wet snow and slush to be plowed from streets onto driveway aprons and sidewalk aprons, which residents should be ready to clear off before they freeze overnight. In the meantime, if intersections or traffic lanes are too slippery and need more sand, please report those to the Streets Divsion at: https://www.cityofmadison.com/reportaproblem/ 

Explainer from Streets and Urban Forestry Superintendent Romines:

Below, Charlie's message to alders elaborates on some misconceptions shared with the Streets Division, answers some common questions, and shares more information about what the next few days will look like:  

"I heard from several people that their street wasn’t plowed until too late after the storm."

"We performed a Citywide General plow twice last week, meaning every street and alleyway in the City was in fact plowed twice, once on Tuesday night [last week] into Wednesday morning, and again on Saturday between midnight and 4pm. We did not perform a City wide\ General plow on Thursday morning as the almost 2" we got Wednesday night did not meet the threshold. Beyond the typical General Plow on Saturday morning we took the additional step of keeping crews on the salt routes, plowing them back as the snow did not end until late Saturday morning. We could not have started the plow any earlier nor been more attentive to the salt route network.

"Could you help me better understand our streets maintenance schedule" - We've had staff on around the clock from 9pm Monday January 8th thru this writing and will continue to have for the foreseeable future as we sand hills, curves, intersections and other slick spots, plow back parking move outs and tend to the CSCL's and the like.

"I am particularly interested in how we carried out our snow maintenance plan this last storm?"

"After salting at the storms onset we had to make a decision on whether to put down a second round of salt immediately following the first. The decision came down to realizing at best a nominal gain in road conditions by putting down a quick second round versus at least a 50\50 risk of creating icy conditions given the specifics of the event. There is an incredible amount people don’t understand about snow and ice and the variables are numerous. This wasn't a matter of putting down salt a time or two more than we did and you've got bare pavement, certainly not in conditions we were facing during the storm and considering what was coming post storm. Your options in a storm like the one late last week are to salt and keep salting and do it fast enough, at a rate high enough, repeatedly and in quick succession enough, to hold off ice formation (Dane County Highways - DOT) or to shut it down before ice starts forming (City of Madison). We are not set up to chase the plunging temps down the rabbit hole with salt, even if we set environmental values [salting] aside. We do not have the capabilities to do what Dane County Highways did to keep the beltline, interstate and surface highway roads they maintain to bare pavement in an event like this. To be clear, a couple more employees, a little bigger OT budget, a hundred grand more for salt, a few more plow trucks etc. would not have changed the outcome for this event. Instead we focused on what we could and did accomplish, keeping the roads plowed wide and safe, putting extra staff on to keep up with the snow and blowing snow.

"Was there anything that went really well or we could have done better?"

"As hard as it is for some to accept, the results we achieved were actually our best possible outcome. Roads were maintained wide and snow covered, and we did not and do not have icy conditions. As much as the snow pack can and has gotten slippery, its not as bad as actual ice and we knew we could keep sanding into it and achieve relatively safe (not optimal) winter driving conditions for the week ahead. If ice had formed (from chasing w salt and not being able to keep up) then sand would not help much and salt would still not be effective at these temps leaving us no real options to maintain the roads for the week ahead, now the week we are in. I am very pleased with the work our staff did and how well we executed our plan given our realities of storm conditions, road types, policies and long held service standards. I should point out this event has some similarities with an event we had in the winter of 2018-2019, less snow in that event but similarly quickly plunging artic temps immediately following the storm. The road conditions we achieved on both salt routes and residentials then and now are identical. The key difference is that arctic plunge only lasted 3-4 days and we were able to start salting and plowing off where as this one looks to last 8 days which keeps these conditions, which while the best we could achieve are certainly not optimal for driving, around a lot longer to wear on peoples nerves and create opportunities for accidents.

"Is there anyway that we can support streets staff with plowing?"

[....] "for our long term staff, they say the last week plus has been the hardest of their careers (20" in 4 days with two City wide General Plows, blowing snow, long term arctic air) with the Friday\Sat snow event a top 3 or 4 most difficult on its own. Realize we are not a DOT (bare pavement at any cost, no trash collections, no sidewalks, bike lanes and bus stops etc. to concern themselves with) and we don't have a bare pavement at any cost policy or service standard and as such we are not resourced or structured organizationally to achieve it in a once in every 5-15 year event like we are experiencing.

"I appreciate and completely understand the concerns some of you and your constituents may have. In my 6 years managing Streets I've had a few Alders reach out about snow and ice practices and policies. I will tell you all the same thing I have shared with them, if we want significantly different outcomes for these types of events we have to have those conversations in the spring and early summer to make significant changes in how Streets\Public Works is resourced and structured along with reconsidering long held policies and values and make very hard decisions in the budget to be able to achieve higher levels of service. I am willing to have those discussions however on the whole I do believe our current policies and service levels strike a reasonable balance of providing safe winter driving conditions as well as environmental and fiscal responsibility.

"I am researching a couple of thoughts we might be able to implement in “break glass in case of emergency” scenarios in the future that perhaps can prevent the long duration snow pack on the salt routes and not be a complete budget buster to implement. Once I have something for consideration I will share that out as appropriate.

"As far as a heads up for what’s coming. If the current forecast holds we will be able to salt the salt routes either Sunday afternoon or Monday morning and start getting those back to pavement. The residential streets by Monday into Tuesday will start to puff up. As they do deep ruts and jagged edges will start to form if we don't plow them off to or near the curb. Given the amount of snow on them many will probably need to be plowed back twice. Many people will be angry about this as the plowing back will impact their driveways which is unavoidable. We are not excited about the possibility of rain on the hard packed side streets so we are hoping it holds off for warmer air to make plowing off possible before the rain comes. Bryan and I will keep you all updated."