City prepared to face the snow
It’s now just a matter of time before the snow hits the streets and when it does, city roads and fleets manager Blake McIntosh says crews are ready to take on the white stuff.
Trucks have been outfitted, sand and salt have been stockpiled, new employees trained and contractors confirmed, he said Monday during a meeting with local media.
“We are definitely prepared for a snow event,” he said.
A full deployment begins whenever the snowfall reaches 75 millimetres or three inches but for smaller snowfalls in between, contingents will be out plowing and sanding as needed, McIntosh added.
Each winter, crews maintain 670 kilometres of road and 189 km of sidewalks. On average, they spread over 3,600 tonnes of fractured rock and 5,200 tonnes of sand.
Along with clearing roads and streets, the work includes pushing back windrows, cutting ice on roadway shoulders in areas lacking curbs and gutters to allow melting snow to drain into ditches, replacing damaged culverts and patching potholes.
At its disposal, the city has seven sanding/ plow trucks, seven graders, four sidewalk plowing and sanding machines, five loaders, one snow blowing loader and two anti-icing trucks. Through contractors, it has access to five graders, 11 loaders, 13 tandem dump trucks and two snow disposal site bulldozers.
Also, the city parks department has its own equipment to remove snow and ice from civic facility parking lots, paths and trails, and other park areas: one backhoe, one Bobcat, one truck plow/sander, and three small tractors with attachments (snow blowers, snow blades or brooms).
In part, the city relies on two weather stations – one at the north end and one in the southwest – to get a heads-up on when snow might be on its way. Road temperatures are also monitored.
Goals and objectives for clearing snow remain unchanged. If at least 75 mm falls in a 24-hour period, the city will aim to clear so-called priority one routes – main arterial roads, the central business district, priority hills, streets adjacent to the hospital and civic facility entrances, priority parking lots, and pathways – within 48 hours.
The same holds true for priority two routes – namely bus routes that are not main arterial roads and all commercial and industrial roads.
If more than 120 mm has fallen, priority three routes – residential roads and lanes, all remaining civic facilities parking lots and select park facilities, parking lots, trails, and pathways – are to be cleared within 72 hours of priority one and two routes being completed.
Residents can help by adhering to onstreet parking restrictions. In residential areas, the practice is prohibited from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. but allowed on the side of the street with odd house numbers from 6 p.m. to 8 a.m. unless otherwise posted.
Likewise, on-street parking on priority one roads and hills is prohibited from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. and, in the downtown, from midnight to 7 a.m.
Violators are subject to a $50 fine and their vehicles may be towed.
“It can be quite a large issue, especially when we get larger volumes,” McIntosh said. “If people aren’t abiding by the parking restrictions... it makes it difficult for that residential area.”
Plowing around vehicles is out of the question, he said, because crews would still have to go back in a second time to remove the snow once the driver has dug the vehicle out.
“If people abide by the bylaw, it definitely makes our job more efficient,” he said.
McIntosh preached patience should the city get hit with a snowfall on the scale of the one that struck last February.
“It was a challenge because we had to reset the clock a few times,” he said.
“It snowed, stopped, we started plowing the main arterials, and then it would snow again and we reset the clock.
“Really, the idea is to keep the main arterials open first because they carry the largest volume of traffic.”
In all, about a metre of snow fell in that month which translated into about 13,000 dump truck loads (up to 500 per day) equaling 261,900 cubic metres of snow going to the city’s disposal sites near 18th Avenue and Foothills Boulevard and Guay Road.
That’s enough to fill CN Centre four times and was roughly equal to the yearly average over the previous three snow seasons.