Salt – Muddy Branch Alliance

Road Salt is a Problem

Road salt is a problem. Salt is useful because it is inexpensive and somewhat effective in melting ice and snow on our roads. Following a storm, major roads should be safe and passable.

Salt is dangerous because:

at high levels it is toxic to plant and animal life;
it corrodes our roads, bridges, and pipes (such as in Flint Michigan), and
it elevates salt levels in our drinking water, making it more dangerous for people with high blood pressure or kidney disease; organizations like WSSC do not take salt out of our water.

The City of Gaithersburg is doing a good job with brine and salt distribution. Not only is the city putting down salt responsibly, but also are cleaning up afterward; we’ve see the street cleaners! Gaithersburg could do better in limiting the salt to only the emergency routes and hilly areas. A flat dead-end or cul-de-sac does not require salt; plowing is all that is needed. This might also save the city a few dollars in salt and labor costs. Gaithersburg does an excellent job plowing snow.

Our state and county also do a good job in salting our streets. They also use brine, they train themselves on smart salt use, and they watch the weather forecasts closely. Private organizations, which make up about 30% of the salt in our streams, do not do a good job. Private organizations are worried about slip and fall litigation and tend to oversalt; they are often untrained and dump salt, sometimes just to make a buck.

Our Monitoring

The Muddy Branch Alliance has been monitoring chloride levels in the Muddy Branch Stream. We have noticed that following snow events, the chloride levels in these streams goes from “fair” (usually from about 80-150 ppm) to “poor” (over 250 ppm) quality. Poor means that the water is toxic, at some level, to animal and plant life. Higher levels of chloride in our streams means higher levels of chloride in our tap. Following a “winter event”, we have seen chloride levels in our tap rise from 45 ppm to more than 130 ppm.

Here is a chart showing salt levels in the Muddy Branch near Rt 28. Notice the high marks, that coincide with winter salt distribution. The chloride levels under Great Seneca Highway and at Watts Branch are even worse.

Actions

The Muddy Branch Alliance is active in spreading the word about salt via local environmental organizations and government committees. We are also monitoring chloride levels along the Muddy Branch and capturing data points from Morris Park to River Road. Our results can be seen on the cleanwaterhub.org web site. For future use, we are capturing pictures of obvious salt distribution problems. We also call the city, county, and state when we see salt distribution problems.

You can help:

If you see a problem with salt on a Gaithersburg City road, you can contact [email protected]
If you see a problem along a state or country road, you can dial 311.
Don’t use rock salt (or equivalent products) on your driveways or sidewalks; try birdseed or sand.
Speak up about salt overuse.

We are also working with Maryland Delegate Lily Qi (from District 15) and the MD Department of the Environment to propose legislation for smart salt distribution by private organizations. Due to slip and fall liability concerns, private organizations tend to oversalt. To help resolve this, if a private contractor becomes trained in Smart Salt Techniques (via the MD Dept of the Environment) and distributes salt appropriately, then the organization hiring the contractor could be shielded from slip and fall liability. The idea is that this would limit the amount of unnecessary salt placed on our streets. This legislation is modeled after the good work done by the state of Minnesota. Minnesota believes that smart salt training can reduce salt use by 30-70%, see https://www.pca.state.mn.us/water/salt-applicators

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