Salt truck crews to continue to salt overnight, focusing on residential areas in Milwaukee

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Crews across the Milwaukee area will continue to salt roads overnight after Tuesday's storm.

The city of Milwaukee has declared a weather emergency through Wednesday morning, Feb. 23 as conditions are expected the remain icy. DPW has not issued a snow emergency, and winter parking rules are not in effect.

"We've been trying to stay ahead of it all day as drivers complete their routes. They come back, they salt again and go right back out and do that route over," Julie Anderson, with Racine County Public Works, said.

Anderson said there were minimal accidents. Main highways are given treatment first and I-94 is the top priority.

"We were hoping traffic would use the mains. Certainly secondary roads, local roads remain slippery yet now and those are things that may take a while to resolve," Anderson said.

Twenty-two salt trucks are out in the county with drivers working 12-hour shifts. They will continue to salt throughout the night as temperatures are expected to drop.

"Whatever is not salted is going to freeze in place, and we don't want to have additional impacts," Anderson said.

Public works crews in Milwaukee will also continue to salt overnight. They are focusing on residential areas, using salt trucks with under bellies to help crush up the sleet and ice.

"Lot of credit goes out to the local DPWs who did such a good job making sure the roads are clear, that if our crews have to respond, the roads are clear and able to get through," Brendan Conway, with We Energies, said.

Conway said there were not many issues with power outages in this storm.

"We had a branch that came into one of our lines, knocked out power, about a thousand people able to get it restored pretty quickly. That was south part of Milwaukee, Cudahy, St. Francis," he said.

Milwaukee is still seeing slick conditions on sidewalks.

Acting Mayor Cavalier Johnson is expected to lift the weather emergency Wednesday morning.