I was reading this article about pervious pavement and one thing that jumped out was a quote from John S Gulliver of the University of Minnesota who says that road salt's cost, in terms of the sticker price of the Salt and the corrosion it creates on bridges and vehicles amounts to $1400 per ton. And that's not counting the impact of water pollution.
For once I agree with you on something.
A town dead between the two of us geographically, Lincoln MA has been salt-free for decades. Somehow the town survives just fine. I-95 in Waltham next to the Cambridge Reservoir is also a salt-free stretch that seemingly has no issues being such for drivers.
I always figured after the Mianus River bridge collapse we would work on this. 35 years later and I watch my idiot town build a salt shed to double down even more on salting the roads.
According to Lincoln, MA's website, they use brine, which is a salt/water combination, to pre-treat their roads, and salt and/or sand to treat the roads during and/or after a storm: https://www.lincolntown.org/403/Snow-and-Ice-Removal-PolicyMailboxes
This EPA report from 2016 also references their use of salt and sand: https://www3.epa.gov/region1/npdes/stormwater/assets/pdfs/ma/reports/2016/Lincoln16.pdf
Both links indicate they try to limit the use of salt and sand, but certainly doesn't appear they been "salt-free for decades".
The first link says nothing about using brine that I can see in it. My conversations with a town official confirm what I already said. The results of them not using salt speaks for itself if you've actually been there in the winter, which I have frequently since I live a mere 15 miles away.
I was reading this article about pervious pavement and one thing that jumped out was a quote from John S Gulliver of the University of Minnesota who says that road salt's cost, in terms of the sticker price of the Salt and the corrosion it creates on bridges and vehicles amounts to $1400 per ton. And that's not counting the impact of water pollution.
When I read articles like this, I notice two things:
There are numerous links to document and justify their findings.
There aren't links to document and justify other findings.
Guess which category the $1,400 falls into?
Sure, some professor at some college said it, but how did they come up with that conclusion?
There are, no doubt, other costs besides the $70/ton rock salt costs to the government agency. Rust is a big one, and that contributes to other issues. But it also needs to be weighed against other costs. We've seen what happens when roads aren't treated - there was the big crash in Texas this year. PA seems to have a few large-scale crashes that shuts down their highways each year. People certainly need to slow down. But we can't justify this by saying "well, someone died...that's the price to pay for not using road salt", especially when the death was an innocent bystander or someone who was driving prudently.
Transportation departments are always looking for ways to save money. If anyone has a *practical* way of doing it, they would be all ears. And hey, if some futuristic method occurs in 10 or 15 years, DOTs will be ecstatic. But, until then, they use what gets the job done.