BUFFALO, N.Y. — The City of Buffalo is preparing for the winter storm that is headed to Western New York.
Commissioner of Public Works, Nate Marton, said the city will have extra crews to handle snow removal and salting the streets.
The winter storm is expected to bring a mix of snow, sleet, rain and possibly ice when it arrives Wednesday afternoon.
"From the city's perspective, we're preparing for a full range; snow, sleet and ice. The amount of ice is really going to be the concern, one of the main concerns in this storm," said Marton.
Marton says city crews will be out salting roads ahead of the storm and treating roads throughout the storm.
The city has 3,000 tons of salt ready to go, and is expecting more to delivered.
The city's Forestry Department will also be on hand.
"Our forestry team and our parks department are prepared as well. We've got crews ready for that, and we've go some crews we can reach out to if we need to if that level really gets high on the ice," Marton said.
Marton says that while city crews will be taking care of the roadways, residents should still be careful traveling throughout the area and use caution, especially when driving and walking on sidewalks.
National Grid Regional Director Ken Kajawa was also at the press conference to talk about their preparations in the event there are power outages due to the storm.
"The presence of ice that we're going to see later on today, obviously, has the potential to cause trees to come down, which can bring down our facilities and cause power outages for our customers," said Kajawa.
National Grid will have additional crews on standby if needed to help local crews.
The City of Buffalo says if there is a need, they will open warming shelters.