Staff photo by Fritz Busch Most of the salt has been removed from the right side of a salt/ sand shed near the Brown County Highway Department office in New Ulm. Sand remains in the left side of the shed. A Brown County Highway Department belly dump trailer was pulled by a semi truck to South St. Paul to pick up a new load of salt.

NEW ULM — After discussion Tuesday, most Brown County Commissioners supported the county highway department continuing with a 25 percent salt/75 percent sand mixture at intersections and curves of county roads.

New District 4 Commissioner Brian Braun of rural Sleepy Eye voiced interest in increasing the salt content in the mixture in order to get roads to bare pavement sooner.

Brown County Highway Engineer Wayne Stevens said the highway department could try a 50-50 salt/sand mix if commissioners favored it, but that it would be more costly.

“I’m for more salt,” Braun said.

Commissioners Tony Berg, Jeff Veerkamp and Scott Windschitl said they supported staying with the 25-75 mixture.

Commissioners Berg and Veerkamp said they felt the county is doing a good job the way they are salting and sanding roads. Berg said he was particularly impressed with CR 29, which he often travels.

“I’m happy where we’re at,” said Veerkamp.

Brown County Assistant Highway Engineer Andrew Lang said the county is pre-treating concrete highways before snow falls.

Stevens said the early winter snowfall has kept his department busy and has taxed its salt supply.

“We sent a semi to the Twin Cities today (Tuesday) to get more salt,” Stevens said.

He said the winter weather has been challenging at times in other ways.

“It took a grader an hour to break a big drift after the last big storm,” said Stevens.

In his monthly update, Stevens said work continued on cofferdam installation after the last cold spell on the Bridge 2110 (Hale Bridge) project over the Minnesota River, near CR 8, several miles northwest of Fort Ridgely State Park.

A cofferdam is a watertight enclosure built in a body of water to allow an enclosed area to be pumped out to permit construction work including bridge piers, below the waterline.

(Fritz Busch can be emailed at fbusch@nujournal.com).