Salt will not "eat your feet". Do we dissolve in the ocean? I doubt if any of the other junk they put on roads will either.
I loath salt on the roads. It hurts. And it melts the snow, turning it into cold slush and water, so I can't run in my socks (http://jogoflap.wordpress.com/2010/12/10/plasti-socks/). Let's not even get into what it does to cars and roads.
Heavy exposure to cold, salty water is hard on your skin. It dries it out. But I'd like to assure you that while references to "meat tenderizer" and "eat your feet" sound good, they have just sound bytes, with no basis in truth.
One more point: Where I live, the melting agent spread on roads in large quantities is salt. The other things used tend to be found on sidewalk, spread from bags bought in the store. I suspect it would be impractical for local governments to import large piles of anything other than regular old Sodium Chloride.
I loath salt on the roads. It hurts. And it melts the snow, turning it into cold slush and water, so I can't run in my socks (http://jogoflap.wordpress.com/2010/12/10/plasti-socks/). Let's not even get into what it does to cars and roads.
Heavy exposure to cold, salty water is hard on your skin. It dries it out. But I'd like to assure you that while references to "meat tenderizer" and "eat your feet" sound good, they have just sound bytes, with no basis in truth.
One more point: Where I live, the melting agent spread on roads in large quantities is salt. The other things used tend to be found on sidewalk, spread from bags bought in the store. I suspect it would be impractical for local governments to import large piles of anything other than regular old Sodium Chloride.