ATLANTA — The Georgia Department of Transportation is getting ahead of the possible winter weather that will hit the state on Saturday.
The National Weather Service has issued a winter weather advisory for many counties north of metro Atlanta. However, the Atlanta area will see some rain and it will be cold.
GDOT is sending crews out overnight to treat the roads.
“In the metro area, our biggest concerns are going to be elevated structure, bridges, overpasses," Natalie Dale said. "So we’re going to be treating all of our interstates again from I-20 north to that north metro area with solid salt.”
She said this treatment is different from the brine they typically use.
“This system is expected to come in and kind of shift from rain to snow back to rain," Dale said. "And if we started with that brine, it would largely get washed away.”
She said crews will get started around midnight treating the roads.
In the northeast and northwest counties, they will be running brine.
“Those counties typically get it worse than metro Atlanta because of higher elevation, colder temperatures,” Dale said.
GDOT said that, since the infamous "Snowmageddon", they’ve enhanced their tools.
On Jan. 28, 2014, little more than two inches of snow brought the city to its knees. The images of cars trapped on the interstate were indelibly fixed in Atlanta's collective memory.
Although the city only received 2.6 inches of snow, cars were stranded on all three highways for up to a day. Over a million people were jammed on the major highways in Atlanta primarily because everyone in the city was attempting to head home out of the snow at the exact same time.
Since that weather event from six years ago, GDOT has made some changes to the way it attacks these situations.
“We have salt, we have rock salt, we have brine, we have, for extreme situations, that calcium chloride,” Dale said. “We tailor our treatment to what the storm looks like it’s going to bring so that we’re effectively treating our roadway.”
For anyone who has to get out, GDOT advises drivers to use caution.
"Stay in as long as you can if you don't have to be on the road," she said.