Northern Utah whitened; roads are slickened

The storm that rolled across northern Utah over the weekend dumped much-needed snow in the mountains, even as it left parts of the state in a traffic mess.

For once it looked like motorists paid attention to warnings, at least in Salt Lake and Davis counties.

Despite snowy conditions and wet roads, the Utah Highway Patrol said there were no reports of injury accidents on the freeways in Salt Lake and Davis counties during the morning commute Tuesday.

UHP Sgt. Wade Breur said it appeared drivers heeded the constant reminders from troopers to slow down. Traffic moved very slowly in some areas Tuesday, but Breur said that resulted in just a small number of accidents.

The drive between Layton and Salt Lake City took some commuters more than 90 minutes.

Between midnight and 9:30 a.m., there were 15 reported slide-offs on highways in Salt Lake County and only a handful in Davis County, he said. But other than one or two accidents in Salt Lake County, there were no serious crashes.

Utah County was a different story.

During that same time period, Breur said there were seven slide-offs, one crash that resulted in injuries and 17 crashes that involved significant damage to vehicles.

One of the crashes was a jackknifed semitrailer truck in Spanish Fork Canyon that tied up traffic.

The Cottonwood canyons also remained relatively problem-free with the exception of one or two slide-offs, according to the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office. The canyons were restricted to cars with four-wheel drive or chains only but were not closed Tuesday morning.

There were several accidents on surface streets around the county.

A 16-year-old boy rolled his car Tuesday morning on 400 West near 400 North, despite not driving very fast.

The Valley Emergency Communications Center, which dispatches for most of the police and fire departments in Salt Lake County, responded to 25 side-street accidents Tuesday morning between 5 and 9 a.m. Nine of those incidents involved injuries, most of which were minor, said VECC deputy director Gary Lancaster.

Also Tuesday, the name of a man injured in an auto-pedestrian accident near Kearns High School was released. Efren Guzman, who turns 42 on Friday, remained in critical condition at LDS Hospital.