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CDOT Ready For Weekend Winter Blast, But Advises Travelers To Be Ready

DENVER, (CBS4)- The Colorado Department of Transportation says if you are headed up to the mountains this weekend, you may want to account for winter weather if you want to avoid traffic and dangerous driving conditions. They anticipate that the Denver metro area will mostly see rain.

Because of that, CDOT says they will not pretreat roads in the city this time around. They say the rain will just wash it away, but of course when it does start snowing, crews will be ready to plow.

Their bigger concern is really traveling through the I-70 mountain corridor.

snow plow i-70 interstate 70 mountains december 24 2021
(credit: CBS)

It's going to snow up there all weekend, and while CDOT will be on top of it they say Sunday night travel will be impacted the most because a snowstorm will roll through just as skiers will be headed home to Denver.

They suggest making it a quick trip and leaving early Sunday if you don't want to want to get stuck in the I-70 crawl.

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Traffic on I-70 (credit: CBS)

"We just want to make sure people are out of the storm not driving in it on top of normal weekend ski traffic," said CDOT Spokesperson Tim Hoover.

CDOT says they have all the tools they need to tackle this storm, but they want drivers to do their part.

Interstate 70 I-70 Traffic Jam
Interstate 70 in Mt. Vernon Canyon (credit: CBS)

They say don't pass plows and slow down because traction is different than stopping distance.

In other words, just because you can drive fast doesn't mean you can stop fast.

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