Master of Science in Engineering, University of Akron, 2017, Civil Engineering

The Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) uses approximately 700,000 tons of salt per year to keep their roads safe of icy conditions during the winter. Recently, ODOT has been experiencing extreme salt pricing in response to their county-by-county bid process. As a result, ODOT's annual cost for snow and ice removal reached approximately $86 million from its maintenance budget. The majority of expenses are accumulated by the procurement of rock salt. In order to identify recommendations for ODOT processes, a matrix of best and current practices was developed at the national, state, and city-level pertaining to winter maintenance. A thorough evaluation of variables which affect salt pricing was conducted. The transportation of salt as well as the delivery times were analyzed. It was concluded that winter salt orders, although modeled over $6.00 less expensive than summer, run a much higher risk of being delivered late. Therefore, a ten-step storage facility evaluation process was created to determine the vulnerability of a storage facility, the estimated cost to increase the capacity, and whether the facility may act as a regional storage location. This process gives ODOT the necessary tools to evaluate their storage facilities on a case-by-case basis due to the diverse environments such as weather found throughout the state of Ohio.

Committee: William Schneider IV Ph.D., P.E. (Advisor); Teresa Cutright Ph.D. (Committee Member); Qindan Huang Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Civil Engineering