WASHINGTON (DC News Now) — Starting Monday night, crews in Washington DC will be pretreating roads and sidewalks in preparation for the snow event forecast for Tuesday.
DC’s District Snow Team will begin salting all roads, including the National Highway System, at midnight on Tuesday.
Before that, the Department of General Service’s snow team will pretreat all DC government properties. That work, which includes police stations, firehouses, DHS shelters, and DCPS buildings started at 8 p.m. Monday.
Rick Birt, the Director of the DC Highway Safety Office, said the snow team includes over 200 pieces of equipment.
“They’re gonna be monitoring conditions,” he said. “Ready to activate to keep our roadways, our sidewalks are bike lanes, all our public transit accessways safe and clear.”
Birt said once the snow starts to fall, the team will wait for two inches to accumulate before plowing will begin.
“Our message to folks is; don’t travel if you don’t have to,” he said. “Take advantage of our world-class metro system, help us out by keeping those roadways clear… If you do find yourself on the roadways, we want people to take it slow on ice and snow. Increase that following distance and decrease that speed.”
