The "I Like The Beet Juice Idea" Story

It was an ordinary day.  The view out my kitchen door is white covered since the snow began falling a few hours ago and isn't expected to stop until dark.  So far this winter I haven't had to pull the cord on my snowblower, since the few snow days have all been minor with a maximum of about four inches falling on the worst day.  I used to love snow and was glad to remain indoors on days when school was canceled and I didn't have to teach that day.  But, that was when I was a bit younger and could handle a foot of snow without having to down a couple of pain pills and rub stuff on my back.  What bothers me the most this snow season is the residue that has made my beautiful new blacktop in front of my house turn an ugly bright gray color.  This past summer the local government decided my neighborhood needed a new paving so they went around the neighborhood and first repaired all the storm drains and rebuilt all the concrete gutters leading to them.  The machines that grind off the top surface of the old road came next and then the nighttime layer of blacktop was rolled over the old roadway.  It looked beautiful and dressed up the neighborhood.  Then the first snow arrived and the street has been an ugly shade of black/white/gray ever since.  My car resembles the road coating, having driven on the road and having the mixture that was put down to help melt the snow, covering the sides of my car as well as the undercarriage.  What is being applied to the roads today seems to be different than the layer of rock salt that used to be used on the streets.  I often wondered where all that rock salt went after the snow had stopped and the first rain cleared the streets of the residue.  

Signage on storm-water drains in many cities and town
whose drains lead to the Chesapeake Bay.

Seems it has been going into the Chesapeake Bay for years and years.  A few years ago I began to notice, on our trips to Maryland for lunch along the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal as well as other small towns whose waterways drained into the headwaters of the Chesapeake Bay, that on their street drains were stenciled notices that read: No Dumping...Drains into the Chesapeake Bay.  Ah Ha, someone realized that all the towns along the Susquehanna River and its tributaries are all contaminating the Chesapeake Bay and killing the fish as well as wildlife that lives along the bay.  And, the winter use of rock salt had to be a big contaminant.  Then I read that they are now trying a few new ingredients to keep the roads safe for driving.  They now lather the roads with beet juice, molasses, pickle brine, cheese brine and even beer waste to make them safer for driving.  The Chesapeake Bay may begin to lose some of its salinity in the future if these items help keep the roads free of snow and ice and cut down on the rock salt and salt brine that has been used for years and years.  Maybe the crabs will grow larger, the seaweed will be greener and the eels will be more slippery.  I guess we can hope that our waterways will once again sustain life as it once did.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of  an ordinary guy.