Street crews preparing for pre-winter storms

It’s all hands on deck for the Pocatello street department Wednesday. Street crews were out all morning plowing roads and spraying salt brine on the streets. However, their job is not done yet. In fact, this first winter storm is just a preview of what they can expect for the rest of the season.

“We definitely don’t want to get behind a storm, so we plan ahead the best we can,” deputy works director for Pocatello, Tom Kirkman said.

An addition to spreading salt aggregate on the road and plowing snow, street crews are already preparing for the next big snow event coming on Thursday night into early Friday morning.

“Right now we’ve address most of the snow accumulation we received today (Wednesday). So now, we’re going into pre-treatments.”

Treating the roads is no easy task. Nearly 15 trucks were dispatched covering every street in town. 

“What we do is when the storm is in progress we focus on the arterial streets... You’re never going to be more than a block or two from a road that hasn’t been treated.”

Many of us take their service for granted. However, Kirkman says crews take pride in what they do.

“Our guys to a really good job and they take pride in what they do. It’s a thankless job. It’s a lot of long hours and late nights but our guys do a wonderful job and they all want to do what’s best.”