There's No Business Like Snow Business
This is my fourth winter as a Township Councillor, and once again Council has received a number of emails concerned about snow plowing in residential areas. See the Township's snow control strategy here. (I should note that there seem to be less complaints this year than in previous winters.) I think most people agree that it is reasonable for the Township to focus its resources on the priority and secondary routes during a snowstorm, but once those roads are clear, there is a feeling among many residents that the plows should do the side streets.
Coming out of the Christmas storms, I have a few thoughts that I will be offering our staff.
First and foremost, the snow control team should be thanked and commended for their long, hard hours over the holidays, clearing the priority and secondary routes. It's never fun to be away from your family on a holiday, working in treacherous conditions, but these folks did it without complaint.
I think we need to have one or two plows readily available to help emergency services. One of my concerns is that a resident may need an ambulance on a side street, and the vehicle will not be able to get there. Our plows use a different radio frequency than emergency services, so it might be worth having an "emergency" plow dedicated and available to the police/fire/ambulance dispatchers. If there is a fire, for example, the plow could run ahead of the trucks to the scene.
The second issue is plowing residential streets. I believe we need to step this up once priority and secondary routes have been taken care of. In the past, this has not always been necessary as the rain usually comes and washed most of the snow away. But in a series of snowstorms like this one, we need to be flexible enough to get plows onto as many sidestreets as possible in the days after the snow.
We also need to keep the Township's website up-to-the-minute with information about road conditions, garbage and recycling service, and other issues that come out of these snow storms. Real time information is invaluable for residents. The website could include a place where people can report on the conditions in their neighbourhood.
As residents, we also need to work on our snow etiquette. In our lane, the south half was passable while the north half was terrible for cars. What was the difference? The five homeowners on the south half (including us) took a little extra time during all of the storms to shovel our sections of the lane. The northern neighbours left theirs pretty much untouched (most of them have large trucks to get in and out with). This gave us the ability to get in and out throughout the weather. This isn't always possible in every street in the Township, but it worked for our little lane. It became a neat little community event, with the five neighbours chatting and working together.
The Township's snow removal policy, like everything we do, is always open for suggestions for improvement. If you have any specific ideas, please feel free to post them here.
Coming out of the Christmas storms, I have a few thoughts that I will be offering our staff.
First and foremost, the snow control team should be thanked and commended for their long, hard hours over the holidays, clearing the priority and secondary routes. It's never fun to be away from your family on a holiday, working in treacherous conditions, but these folks did it without complaint.
I think we need to have one or two plows readily available to help emergency services. One of my concerns is that a resident may need an ambulance on a side street, and the vehicle will not be able to get there. Our plows use a different radio frequency than emergency services, so it might be worth having an "emergency" plow dedicated and available to the police/fire/ambulance dispatchers. If there is a fire, for example, the plow could run ahead of the trucks to the scene.
The second issue is plowing residential streets. I believe we need to step this up once priority and secondary routes have been taken care of. In the past, this has not always been necessary as the rain usually comes and washed most of the snow away. But in a series of snowstorms like this one, we need to be flexible enough to get plows onto as many sidestreets as possible in the days after the snow.
We also need to keep the Township's website up-to-the-minute with information about road conditions, garbage and recycling service, and other issues that come out of these snow storms. Real time information is invaluable for residents. The website could include a place where people can report on the conditions in their neighbourhood.
As residents, we also need to work on our snow etiquette. In our lane, the south half was passable while the north half was terrible for cars. What was the difference? The five homeowners on the south half (including us) took a little extra time during all of the storms to shovel our sections of the lane. The northern neighbours left theirs pretty much untouched (most of them have large trucks to get in and out with). This gave us the ability to get in and out throughout the weather. This isn't always possible in every street in the Township, but it worked for our little lane. It became a neat little community event, with the five neighbours chatting and working together.
The Township's snow removal policy, like everything we do, is always open for suggestions for improvement. If you have any specific ideas, please feel free to post them here.
posted by Jordan Bateman @ 11:23 AM
