City purchases spreader bed, preps for coming weather

By COREY NOLES

Statesman Staff Writer

The City of Dexter has enlisted the help of a new tool to aid in their efforts to keep the streets passable during winter weather.

For years now, the city has had the ability to pre-treat its roads with salt. While that is a useful tool, it does have its limits.

"The temperature has to be just right," said Street Superintendent Jeff Myers as he checked the forecast for the pending winter weather. "As long as it stays in the low-30s or upper 20s, the salt solution works well. If it gets any colder than that, the solution can freeze on the roads."

That's a problem Myers does not want to find himself facing.

It's those super-cold winter weather episodes that have left the City of Dexter at a disadvantage as they work to keep city streets open to traffic. While they can pre-treat streets, they are limited as to what they can do after the snow or ice has fallen.

When the city begins plowing the streets, if the snow is too deep or the ice too thick, the city may not be able to clear the roads. Because the city operates with smaller trucks than the Missouri Department of Transportation or Liberty Township, it is more difficult, if not impossible, to remove ice from the streets.

Until now, the city was even without a means of spreading cinders on the roads to help increase traction. After all of the difficulties they faced during the snowstorm of early December 2013, which dumped nearly a foot of snow on the county, the city decided to purchase a small spreader bed.

The spreader bed was purchased from Liberty Township and is small enough that it was of little use to the road district. However, its size may be beneficial to the city of Dexter.

Myers said that with narrow city streets, there will be many roads where the smaller model will be preferable.

While they are grateful to have the new equipment, Myers did say that an additional larger spreader would also be beneficial to the city.

For many jobs, he said, the small model will be fine. But when dealing with wider roads, the larger piece of equipment would give them the ability to make roads passable at a much faster rate.

The spreader the city purchased is strapped onto one of their flat-bed pickup trucks. It has its own engine, where some of the larger spreaders work from the truck's engine.

They were, however, able to wire it up to be operated from within the vehicle.

"That way we can turn it off at traffic lights instead of just piling the cinders onto the road," Myers said. "We're really excited to have it."

Myers said he expects that the cinders will play a major role in helping to expedite the clearing of city intersections and streets.

After purchasing the spreader bed in early January, Myers said his department has been working to get it up and functional in the truck.

"There were several items we had to buy to get it up and running," he said. "It wasn't anything major though."

In the days following, he began sending his employees down to New Madrid to pickup loads of cinders. They currently have 10 dump truck loads in stock.

Myers said the "cinders," as they are commonly called, are given away, whereas road salt can be "quite expensive."

In the last snowstorm, Myers said the city used approximately $4,000 in salt to make solution for the roads. That is strictly the cost of the salt, and does not include labor to make and spread the solution or fuel for the trucks.

While pre-treating will still be necessary, the ability to spread the cinders should be an effective addition to the project.