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Snowy year added up in Minn. road salt

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ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) -- Just how snowy was Minnesota's winter and spring? The road salt tells the tale.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation this week tallied the road salt usage for the winter driving season. It came in at more than 304,500 tons.

That's a marked increase from the year before, when 154,000 tons of salt was laid down in an unseasonably warm winter. It's also 47 percent above the five-year average.

In western Minnesota, they ran out of salt on hand and had to import it from MnDOT districts in the state's east.

All told, MnDOT says it spent $90.5 million on labor, equipment and materials to keep clear the roads of snow and ice. That's up from about $46 million the prior winter driving season.

MnDOT maintains 12,000 miles of state highways.