Snow-and-ice policy under review
Edmonton looks dirty to out-oftown visitors.
Its residential intersections are dangerous with glare ice and gravel. Seniors with walkers get trapped by the ruts and windrows. There are alternatives. This doesn’t have to be just part of a winter city, said Doug Jones, Edmonton’s new head of city operations, who is setting up the largest rethink of the city’s snow and ice policy in years.
“Our practises are very vehiclecentric and also the climate has changed,” said Jones.
“Now we get these mild spells ... (The snow pack) turns to solid ice. You have to adjust your practices.”
For Jones and Eduardo Sosa, director of roadway maintenance, pretty much everything is on the table.
When they go to a meeting of city council in June, they plan to outline what it would take to plow all residential neighbourhoods down to bare pavement, how Edmonton could scale up to clear walking paths throughout the park system, and what it would take to get bike lanes cleared quickly.
In the meantime, they’re running pilot projects, commissioned an independent review from independent auditor KPMG and recruited a citizens’ panel to spend four Saturdays studying the issues.
“We want to make sure we have a safe way for people, whether they’re walking, cycling or driving or using a wheelchair,” said Jones, adding image is important, too.
Edmonton can likely reduce dust and dirt by limiting the amount of salt and sand it uses, replacing it with environmentally-friendly alternatives, he said.
“Yes, we’re a winter city but we don’t want to be perceived as a dirty winter city.”
We want to make sure we have a safe way for people, whether they’re walking, cycling or driving or using a wheelchair.
PILOT PROJECTS
City officials have two pilot projects on the go.
For the first, they hired Carmacks Maintenance to spray calcium chloride anti-icing solution 12 to 24 hours before a snow fall. It’s like “spraying Pam in a frying pan,” said Graeme Douglas, operations manager.
That makes it easier to scrape the snow off, prevents black ice and means city crews need less regular salt and sand later.
It also has fewer environmental impacts and works to minus 30 C, said Douglas.
His team has been using the solution on Anthony Henday Drive for about five years, and city officials say initial results from Yellowhead Trail, St. Albert Trail, Gateway Boulevard and Calgary Trail are positive.
WALKING PATHS
The second pilot is measuring what it would take to clear all the walking paths in district parks. The pilot is in Glengarry, where a trail connects schools, a daycare, community league and transit stops, said city park staff.
The cost was minimal — an extra hour of staff time per snow event — because staff were already doing some snow clearing in the park. The city is measuring user data to see if more people actually got out walking.
Winter snow maintenance is one of the first projects tackled as part of the program review, a major rethink of city services launched during the 2015 budget debates.
RESIDENTIAL BLADING
Residential blading is one of the toughest challenges, said Sosa, head of roadway maintenance. Council changed its policy several times in recent years and now requires plowing down to five centimetres of snow.
But that means people look outside and don’t realize the plow came through. It also leaves the intersections icy — either with glare ice on top of snow or solid ice after a thaw.
But scraping to bare pavement is tough when many people don’t move their cars, and if crews can’t leave a windrow somewhere rather than hauling all the snow away. Sosa said they’re exploring different equipment and plan to simply lay out the options for council in June.
The city hopes to have automatic licence plate reading technology sometime this year, said Sosa. “That could change the game when it comes to enforcement.”