PennDOT Urges Pennsylvanians to Prepare for Winter Driving

By Alison Smith:

As the snow begins to fall, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation is urging residents to prepare for the winter driving season.

“PennDOT has an enormous responsibility to keep travel as safe as possible through the winter,” PennDOT Secretary Barry J. Schoch said. “We started preparing for this winter as soon as the last one ended, and the public should be preparing themselves and their vehicles for whatever winter will throw our way.”

This winter, 5,400 operators and 2,250 trucks will maintain more than 40,000 miles of state-maintained roadway, PennDOT said.

PennDOT suggests motorists carry with them an emergency kit containing:

• non-perishable food;
• water;
• first-aid supplies;
• warm clothes;
• a blanket;
• cell phone charger;
• and a small snow shovel.

Consider your individual needs when compiling your emergency kit, PennDOT says -- you may want to include medications or baby items, for example.

PennDOT also urges motorists to adjust their driving for conditions.

“If motorists encounter snow or ice-covered roads, they should slow down, increase their following distance and avoid distractions,” PennDOT said. “Last winter, there were 427 crashes resulting in two fatalities and 130 injuries on snowy, slushy or ice-covered roadways where aggressive-driving behaviors such as speeding or making careless lane changes were factors in the crash.”

PennDOT said that last winter, it used some 1.2 million tons of salt. It so far has stockpiled 639,000 tons of salt for this winter, the agency said.