Cedar Rapids Public Works Department prepares for more winter weather with detailed system, new material

CEDAR RAPIDS — For many, driving doesn’t usually require much forethought most of the year.

But for cities and municipalities across Iowa, winter weather requires a little more planning. For the Cedar Rapids Public Works Department, it takes days of planning, dozens of snowplows, and hundreds of staffers working around the clock to make daily travel possible.

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It also takes thousands of tons of salt, hundreds of thousands of gallons of brine and other organic compounds that all make science a winter motorist’s best friend.

Brian McLeod has served in the Cedar Rapids Public Works Department for 29 years, the last three of which have been as streets superintendent. Prior to becoming superintendent, he plowed snow for 17 years.

Here’s how his team keeps the streets clear from snow and ice during inclement winter weather.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Q: Walk us through the whole process when you’re preparing for a snowstorm. What goes into planning?

A: As soon as we realize that we have potential snow on the way, we meet as a supervisor group, we start talking about planning, and we continue to look at updated weather services. Then we go out and work with our staff to start looking at our equipment, to make sure that all the equipment is in working condition.

If there are problems, we turn the vehicles in to our fleet services so they can be fixed prior to the storm.

We pretreat all of our main drags, bridges, schools, emergency snow routes prior to any storm.

Then, as we get closer, our game plan changes according to what changes with the forecast. We take the most recent forecast, we put a plan together, and we roll with it.

Q: How many staff members are involved in the process to clear streets?

A: When we have a planning session, there could be up to nine people in the room.

When we go into action, into what I call an “all plow” situation in the city, when we send out all of our forces, we have around 100 people and 100 pieces of equipment.

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Q: How many miles of streets and roads is your department responsible for?

A: We have over 1,400 lane miles. We also have over 35 miles of sidewalk and bridges.

We have many miles of city-owned sidewalks. We are responsible for cleaning out the downtown bridge area.

Q: How do you prioritize streets and roads when you’re planning to plow?

A: As far as priorities go … all of our main arterials are the first thing that we try to clear out and make safe for the residents. Once we get our main arterials in shape, we break off into our secondary mains and our residential areas.

When we are in a full blown “all-plow,” after the last snowflake falls, we try to have the city completely cleared out in 12 hours.

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Q: Do you have plows out before the snow stops?

A: We have a numbered system. We’re usually at a Level 2, (which) could put us anywhere from 16 to 20 vehicles out fighting a storm while it’s snowing, before we bring the rest of our staff in to complete the all-plow.

We have people that can only work a certain amount of time in the equipment, so we have to juggle different numbers of people around the clock, 24 hours.

It’s a math problem, and it can become difficult, but it’s something we have to mitigate.

Q: You said your team usually operates at Level 2. How many levels does your response system have?

A: When we're in a Level 2 situation, that means that we have snow falling, that there's going to be a large accumulation — usually anything over four inches. It's going to require an all-plow later on in the storm.

We bring in a certain amount of people that run our main arterials to try to remove snow throughout the night so it's not difficult when we go into a full blown all-plow.

Our first snowplow this year was a 12-inch snow. We had trucks in removing snow off those main arterials, so when we called the all-plow, we were not removing 12 inches of snow at the very beginning of the plow.

We call it “the clean up.”

We have three levels: a Level 1, Level, 2 and an all-plow.

Q: What kind of skills do plow drivers have to learn during their training?

A: They're in a large, very expensive piece of equipment. So we want to make sure that they have been given all the tools that they need to operate this snowplow equipment on the city street.

There's a lot of obstacles out there. Obviously, when you look at the street when there is no snow on it, and then all sudden, you go out in a snowplow, and this street is 100 percent covered, it's a whole different look.

We try to send our operators out on what we call dry runs before they even get snow on the ground. We let these operators go through their snowplow routes and get familiar with these routes and a lot of the obstacles that they may incur during their snowplow.

There are a lot of medians, there are catch basins, there's manhole covers, there's areas where we may have a crack in the street that they may have to familiarize themselves with. Any kind of bumps out there that may cause the operator to get startled while they're operating.

Q: How does your department decide when to salt versus when to sand the roads?

A: Over the last five years, our goal is to get rid of sand 100 percent, so we use very, very little sand anymore. We are almost 100 percent salt, brine and blending our brine and salt with the AG64.

Most recently, this year, we've been blending in a organic material called AG64. What that material does is it allows our chemicals to create a bond in between the snow pack and the street, and it allows us to go at colder temperatures, below zero.

As we speak right now, I would say we're probably at 90 percent chemical and 10 percent sand. We use it strategically, usually the brine and the AG64 are used for pretreating purposes.

But we also have liquid tanks on our spreaders where we shoot brine on our rock salt as we're spreading to activate the salt before it hits the street. So we have two purposes for brine: pretreating and pre-wetting at the spinner of the snowplow.

Our pretreating is used to help so there isn't a bond between the snow pack and the roadway. It helps keep a layer there where it doesn't bond. So when we go out for the first plow, it plows that snow off the road and helps us get a cleaner roadway.

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Q: Why is getting rid of sand a goal?

A: Sand is not good for our stormwater system. It gets into our systems, and then we have to clean it. It can block things up, and then our sewer department has to go in and clean these systems out so our rainfall and snow melt can actually get down into the storm systems.

It also helps us from not having to sweep the streets as much as we have in the past. Because when you do sweep the streets, the material that you get from the streets you have to take to the landfill, and that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars.

We have been able to remove those costs, which in turn, we can spend on other things in the Public Works area.

Typically, right now, we would only pull (sand) out if we had a real heavy ice storm. It would basically go on hills, any shaded areas, any dangerous curves, things like that.

Q: How much salt do you use?

A: We probably go through anywhere from 7,500 to 8,200 tons of salt a year, depending on what kind of snow season we get. We also make our own brine, so those tons of salt are included into the brine making.

I believe last year we made around 300,000 gallons of brine.

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Q: What kind of conditions make your job more difficult?

A: Our plan is planning for the worst and hoping for the best.

Every storm is different, but in all actuality, we do fight these storms the same way, no matter how small or how big they are. We're really consistent on pretreating our roads prior to storms, and we are really into liquids now, into the science of how to fight snowstorms and ice storms.

Q: What do you think the public misunderstands about your department’s work to clear the roads?

A: We really stress to our operators the safety that we have to use when operating out there on the public streets. So yeah, it is going to take a little while for us to get this city plowed out.

We do have our 12-hour goal that we have in mind, and sometimes that's affected by the large amounts of snow that we may get. So we need to, first of all, be safe when we're removing this, take our time, remove the snow. There are all kinds of people pushing snow out there.

(When) snow ends up back on the roads, that may not be because of our plowing not getting in there. That could be from people snow blowing their snow back out into the streets. We have that quite a bit throughout the city.

When you put that salt down on snow, it almost turns into a slush. So it goes from a snow pack to a slush, and it fluffs up, and may not look like we have plowed, but we have been in there. We put material down, and we just have to wait for that material to 100 percent start to work.

It takes a lot of patience. When we get snowstorms like this, Cedar Rapids does not have a clear pavement policy, so there is always going to be snow on the roadway, unless Mother Nature helps us out with the sun shining.

Along with our chemicals, that may reduce the snow much faster, and that is great for everyone, but we do not have a clear pavement policy. Our goal is to get the snow off the street, get it pushed to the curb in the quickest amount of time possible, but also being safe and being careful out there, so we do not break our equipment, we do not ruin our infrastructure, and we, most importantly, do not have injuries.

Q: What can the public do to make your job easier?

A: When it comes to our plowing, just giving us space. When you see a snowplow, you see the lights going, you see chemicals coming out of the back, give that truck space, because that operator cannot see vehicles when they're directly behind the truck.

They have two mirrors. They're looking out for people at all times. But if you get too close to the trucks, you get out of the mirror visual, and we cannot see you. If we have to make abrupt stops or do any backing motions, that could cause problems.

Also, slow down, just take your time. Give yourself extra time when you need to get somewhere. If it is snowing out there, you are not going to be able to drive at the speeds that you normally drive at or turn on the speeds that you normally turn at.

Also, if residents could understand that blowing snow back in the streets will only create more problems. We cannot get to all these 1,400 lane miles more than once in consecutive days. So if we're putting snow back out on the street, it's going to create problems for not only the homeowner that's doing it, but for other homeowners in the neighborhood.

I want to stress on the safety that it takes for our operators to complete these snow plows, and the amount of time that our operators are in their trucks. They are tired by the end of these operations.

You’ve got to put the human element into it, so please be patient with us.

Comments: Features reporter Elijah Decious can be reached at (319) 398-8340 or elijah.decious@thegazette.com.