NEWS RELEASE
CITY OF TIMMINS
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In Northern Ontario, we are no strangers to the slips and slides on our roads, leading City of Timmins crews to use approximately 16,000 metric tonnes (that’s 35,273,962 pounds) of sand on our streets, roads and sidewalks every winter.
The addition of our frigid cold temperatures has led our teams to mix salt into our sand at a ratio of three per cent to prevent our sand from freezing but has no melting properties at that ratio.
Straight salt is only used on Class 1, 2 and 3 roads to try and maintain bare pavement throughout the winter, and only when pavement temperatures are -15C or warmer. These include roads such as the Connecting Link, Shirley to Lafleur, Lafleur, Laforest, Airport, Theriault, Ross and Jubillee.
The salt is used to create a brine and prevent the bond of snow and ice to the road so it can be plowed off. A small number of high-speed Class 4 roads are treated with a sand salt mix, such as Municipal, Fredrickhouse Lake Road and Kamiskotia, the rest of the roads and streets under Class 4, 5 and 6 are only sanded for traction and are allowed to form snow-pack conditions.
On average, the city spreads between 6,500 and 7,000 metric tonnes of salt per winter on our class 1, 2 and 3 roads. Sand is delivered mixed and stacked for less than $10 per metric tonne, while salt has increased in price by 12 per cent since last year and is in excess of $120 per metric tonne.
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