Road crews are watching for re-freezing

Conditions on the roads have been up and down on the roads Monday evening.

Snow went from heavy to light and back to heavy within a few minutes in Manitou Springs.

On Highway 24 above the city, numerous Colorado Department of Transportation trucks passed by during the evening, making the trek between Colorado Springs and Woodland Park.

Crews have been putting ice melt on the roads and plowing them on a regular basis.

The melt has also made the road conditions wet in spots.

That’s one of the things that the city crews are more concerned about than just about anything else.

They can get rid of the ice that forms when the temperatures get cold, but there are limitations.

“The challenge is: When does the moisture hit? If it’s in the middle of rush hour our ability to get out and pre-treat is pretty minimal. At that point it’s de-icing,” said Jack Hadley from the Colorado Springs Streets Division.

That’s called re-freezing – it’s something that happens on the roads when temperatures get below freezing.

That’s especially true on the side streets so they become especially tricky as the night goes on due to a lack of de-icer put on those streets.

Monday night, both Hadley and Steve Barden from El Paso County told us that they had crews ready to go.