TRAVERSE CITY - The cold temperatures are not giving the roads a chance to thaw, and drivers are struggling with the ice and snow.
“When it’s this cold, the salt doesn’t work as well as it does with the, higher temperatures. So, what we have to do is we have to do a little bit of a different mix, and it’s a little more sand than it is salt,” explains, Grand Traverse County Road Commission Superintendent, Larry Lacross.
What the sand does is help your car grip to the road better because the temperatures are not right for it to melt, but when the temperatures are right, Lacross says the plow drivers are ready.
“When our guys go out, they know their routes very, very well. Everyone knows where they have spots of ice, where they have spots of hard pack and where they have, spots of bare pavement. Today, you’re not going to see a lot of bare pavement, but, there are days when they go clean up. Days where we’re going out there and we’re saying, hey, I got that hard pack. I’m going to try to get that off, or I have that shoulder that’s got more snow, or I have that drift that’s blowing over. So, they know their routes very, very well.
Joseph Rivera from Traverse City was driving around the Old Mission Peninsula this morning and he says he experienced some pretty bad conditions.
“Lately it’s been pretty rough. I was driving on the old Mission Peninsula this morning, and that was the roughest time. I drive a work van every day for work, and, it’s a rear wheel drive vehicle, and that’s pretty rough. Slip and slide everywhere. Saw, like, eight cars in a ditch this morning.”
Rhys Green, who works at a convenience store on South Airport Road, says he’s witnessed cars struggling.
“It was very bad. Some guy actually just got stuck up on the hill recently, so that was terrible. He had to turn around.”
Lacross is reminding drivers that while the roads are still slick to continue to be aware when driving.
“The biggest advice I’d give to a driver right now is to slow down and recognize that pretty much every intersection right now is glare, ice, and there’s really not much we can do about it. We’re trying to put the sand out there to give them a little more grit so that they can stop.”