The Colorado Department of Transportation spent an extra $25 million on snow and ice removal statewide during last winter’s unusually rough weather, yet even with the emergency funding, CDOT left motorists with roadways that had more residual snow and slush than in previous years.
Wednesday, the Colorado Transportation Commission considered still-further relaxation of CDOT’s standard of what constitutes a plowed and deiced roadway at a special workshop to address budget shortfalls.
Until winter 2007-08, CDOT’s target was to maintain wet, bare pavement throughout snowstorms on interstates and other major Colorado roads in the national highway system, such as U.S. 36. Officials call it “level of service B.”
Last winter, the 2007-08 season, CDOT let its targeted level of service slip a bit, to one that could tolerate more patches of snow and slush on major highways during storms, a B-minus level of service.
This winter, in part to account for the rising cost of deicing chemicals, CDOT’s winter plowing standard will slip still further, to a C-plus service level — one that might leave even more wintry residue on roadways.
Commissioners agreed Wednesday to reverse this trend of less stringently deicing and plowing roadways when they moved another $10 million into CDOT’s snow and ice budget for 2009-10.
Without the additional money, the 2009-10 snow-removal target would drop to a more hazardous service level C, officials said.
The new funds came from the agency’s already depleted highway “surface treatment” budget, which goes toward resurfacing roads.
Much of the additional snow and ice money will go to buy expensive deicing chemicals, said Ed Fink, a former CDOT official who now is a consultant to the agency.
The hike in funding raises the 2009-10 snow budget to $69 million, nearly $20 million more than this season.
It also restores service to level B, which is aimed at delivering deiced and plowed-bare pavement on major roadways as much as possible during storms.
