Yelm staff present winter operations plan outlining anti-icing, priority routes and staffing

Dean Norton, public services department operations manager, presented the City of Yelm's winter operations plan to the City Council on Oct. 28, describing equipment, routing priorities and staffing protocols the city will use during snow and ice events.

Norton said the city used an interlocal agreement with Thurston County last year to purchase anti-ice material and that the agreement produced "about $2,500" in savings this year; the savings allowed the city to purchase two larger tanks and replace a gravity filling method with a pump for faster, safer truck refills. "That allowed us to get a pretreatment done quite a bit faster and much more efficiently," Norton said.

Why it matters: the plan defines how city crews will protect priority routes that serve emergency services and schools and explains limits on anti-icing so residents understand when and why roads will or will not be treated.

Norton described the city's fleet as two plow-equipped trucks, two trucks with liquid anti-ice sprayers and one dump truck with a sander/spreader, all prepared for inclement weather. He said salt-brine anti-icing is applied before predicted freezing events when precipitation is not expected; "when the roads are wet, the anti ice material does not work," Norton said, adding that heavy moisture washes the treatment away. He said the city monitors forecasts daily and will generally "err on the side of caution": "I'd rather have it on the ground and not need it than not have it on the ground and need it," Norton said.

Operational thresholds and priorities in the plan include: anti-icing only when roads are not soaked; sanding and salting for icy conditions or when precipitation is forecast; plows deployed when snow depth reaches 3 inches; and staffing during severe storms with two-truck, four-person crews working 12-hour shifts while hazardous conditions exist. Norton said priority 1 routes—those serving city facilities, police and fire and likely school routes—cover roughly 32 lane miles, which he described as about 16.5 centerline miles; the city will treat and plow priority 1 roads first and move to priority 2 and 3 as conditions allow.

Council members asked about specific roads and hills on the city map and raised environmental concerns about treatment materials reaching nearby waterways. Norton said the materials used are eco-friendly and emphasized operational limits: anti-icing cannot be used effectively on wet roads. He also said when snowplows are dispatched he will notify the public services director, the city administrator and the mayor of field operations.

The full City of Yelm winter operations plan is posted on the city website, Norton said. The presentation and council discussion did not result in formal action.