TxDOT crews across Texas working to ensure safe travel conditions

Brining roads and securing traffic signals among efforts.

A TxDOT crew member in Pharr helps ensure traffic signals remain operational ahead of major winter storm.
Courtesy of TxDOT

MYSA
By Zachary-Taylor Wright
January 13, 2024

As Texas braces for an arctic blast which is set to send temperatures plummeting to new lows for 2024, ranging from the single digits to the low 20s across the state, the Texas Department of Transportation offices across the Lone Star State are gearing up for icy road conditions. For real, y’all, this freeze is no joke, and a bit of extra preplanning can go a long way in keeping Texans safe on state highways.

From San Angelo in Central Texas to Atlanta, Texas, near the state’s border with Arkansas in far East Texas, crews with the Texas Department of Transportation are working to prepare state highways and roads for an impending arctic blast which could bring freezing rain and sub-zero wind chills to many parts of the Lone Star State. The storm is slated for a Sunday, January 14, impact with Texas, and it’s expected to bring some unbearably cold temperatures and the chance of freezing rain and icy road conditions.

San Angelo in Central Texas, Youkum and Austin in South Central Texas, Pharr near the southern most tip of the state, and both Beaumont and Atlanta in the far Eastside of the Lone Star State have all shared online reports of crews who are out this week pretreating roads ahead of the inclement weather. While it’s always wise to just avoid hopping on the highway if you can ahead of such intense winter weather, you can rest assured TxDOT crews are doing their best to keep the state highways free of icy accumulations.

Interstate 20 and Interstate 30, as well U.S. Highway 59, are being treated across the TxDOT Atlanta office’s nine counties, according to a comment from the East Texas.

“Brine operations are scheduled for tomorrow/Friday on Interstates 20 & 30, US 59, and all bridges across our 9-county area,” the Atlanta office tweeted Thursday, January 11. “We will likely be out in the same areas again on Sunday. If you see our crews, please give them plenty of space.”

With strong sustained winds with gusts upwards of 50 mph set to accompany the chilly days ahead, TxDOT crews in Pharr are getting ahead of the storm to ensure operational traffic signals during the storm. And crews from San Angelo to Houston have started brining highways and major thoroughfares to ensure proper traction for tires.

“As the forecasted arctic cold front approaches our area, crews have been preparing equipment and in the last two days have spread more than 20,000 gallons of brine to bridges, overpasses, curves, and other known problem areas across our 15-county district,” the TxDOT San Angelo office tweeted out Friday, January 12.