Simple questions, not-so-simple answers

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One of the most popular features of the Snyder Daily News each day is the Ask Us question — particularly when it asks about something the public considers controversial.

Most often, the questions we are able to get answered relate to some kind of public record — the kind of document available to newspapers, but also available to anyone from the public who asks for a copy. We tend to stay away from information that relates to private companies or individuals who are not considered public officials or employees.

Sometimes the questions ask for a judgment or opinion in the answer. Those are harder to get answered because many times the decision was made, “just because.” And yes, that type of decision-making process is usually why the question gets asked in response.

There are also questions that, well frankly, don’t make a lot of sense. When we know the person who asked, we try to get some clarification so we can follow up. But because we accept questions from anonymous sources, we often don’t know with whom to follow up, so the question just dies an anonymous death.

And sometimes there are questions that are so broad or require such a detailed knowledge that we struggle to find anyone to answer all the different parts — and when we do, it often takes a great deal of time to get all the pieces and parts together. A recent example came from a gentleman who wanted to know why the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is allowed to apply brine water to our roadways in order to pre-treat the surfaces when ice threatens.

The editorial department has not received an answer from TxDOT and the question baffled road experts that were contacted.

According to TxDOT, the agency has extensively used brine, a solution of water and salt, in recent years to pre-treat roadways before freezing precipitation. The brine is applied using spray nozzles attached to tanks mounted on the back of TxDOT trucks, forming a milky appearance on the roadway. You’ve probably noticed the off-white stripes on state highways around Snyder a couple times the past few months. 

The brine helps to prevent frozen precipitation from binding to the pavement, which is helpful when it comes time to remove the snow and ice.

The brine solution is usually about 23 percent salt, according to www.accuweather.com.

“Using salt brines proves not only to be more effective on roads, but it is also cost effective. It takes four times less salt to prevent ice accumulation than to remove ice after it has formed,” the weather service’s website states.

However, a little more research also indicated it much worse on our vehicles than the more traditional rock salt formula TxDOT used to apply to paved surfaces. Apparently because it’s a liquid, it tends to stick to the vehicle’s surfaces more “effectively” than rock salt, leading to greater corrosion.

According to an article on the University of Massachusetts’ Center for Agriculture, Food and the Enviroment website, brine can also be very harmful to plants.

“Salt spray can cause salt burn on buds, leaves and small twigs. Salt spray can also cause damage by desiccating the bud scales, exposing tender tissues of the developing leaves and flowers. The unprotected developing leaves and flower buds dry out and are often killed by the cold winter wind. Many times, the damage is not evident until late winter or spring. Needle or leaf browning, bud death, and branch dieback on the side of the plant facing the road or sidewalk is a common sign of salt spray damage. Damage to deciduous plants is not seen until growth resumes in the spring. Plants are also affected by dissolved salts in runoff water,” the website states.

If it means safer roadways, and it’s less expensive than other alternatives, I think the directed brine spray on paved surfaces is probably a good, proactive step for TxDOT to take. And I’m glad we got to research the question.

 

Bill Crist is the publisher of the Snyder Daily News. Comments about his column may be emailed to publisher@snyderdailynews.com.