To keep the roads free, officials are actually warning Harris County residents not to evacuate

Officials are urging Harris County residents not to evacuate in the wake of Hurricane Harvey.

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While the current forecast calls for a massive amount of rain, officials want residents in the Houston area to stay off the roads so others in coastal areas can evacuate more inland freely.

“There are mandatory evacuations in place to areas to our south in Brazoria County and in Matagorda County and further down the coast. Those residents need to have open freeways to evacuate through our area,” Jeff Lindner, of the county’s Flood Control District and the Office of Emergency Management said in a statement.

“We do not need people inland evacuating the coast. We don’t even need people in the Harris County portion evacuating the coast. We are not going to have that significant of a storm surge in Galveston Bay that you need to leave,” he continued.

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The Harris County Office of Emergency Management, however, advised Houston residents to take care of any weekend errands as early as possible in advance of the storm.