The City of Fort Wayne Street Department’s snow removal fleet is being checked and will be ready to begin snow removal when needed later this week.
City of Fort Wayne news release:
City Prepared for Forecasted Snowfall
Fort Wayne, Indiana (January 31, 2022) – To prepare for the snow event predicted Wednesday, the City of Fort Wayne Street Department fleet is being checked and will be ready to begin snow removal when needed. Pretreating the roads with a de-icing brine to reduce ice formations is likely not an option because the rain predicted leading up to the ice and snow event will wash away any substance applied to the roads.
Crews are prepared to plow around the clock throughout the snow event. The Street Department urges citizens to be patient and to avoid traveling on the streets while crews are plowing. It could take a long time to clear streets if Fort Wayne receives close to a foot of snow, and salt will not be applied until the streets are cleared.
The city is divided into eighteen snow routes with each route assigned a minimum of two trucks. Streets in each route are prioritized as one (arterials), two (collectors and Citilink bus routes), and three (residential). Priority one streets are the first streets to receive plowing and salting. Whenever the priority one streets are deemed safe for travel during or after a snowfall, the city’s plow trucks begin operations on the priority two streets. After these streets are completed, trucks will move in to residential streets if there is an accumulation of three inches or more of snow. If during plowing operations on priority two or three streets it begins to snow again and priority one streets become slippery, trucks will be dispatched back to these streets as needed.
While no snow event is exactly the same, as a rule of thumb it usually takes 10-12 hours AFTER the snow stops falling to plow and salt priority one and two streets. Residential streets generally take 48 hours to plow, assuming the plow trucks can continue working on those areas and don’t have to move back to priority one or two streets.
The Street Department is responsible for 1,200 miles of streets and roads. Click here for more information about Street Department efforts.
Click here for the latest on Winter Storm Landon.
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