City crews working to clear 15th Street after P.A. received a heavy snowfall over the weekend. (Dawson Thompson/paNOW Staff)

By Dawson Thompson

'North Poll'

Crews working to clear roads on election day

Nov 9, 2020 | 10:29 AM

The city of Prince Albert woke up to a few feet of snow on the roads, Monday morning.

According to city roads manager Brent Kennedy, the public needs to be patient with city workers as they make their way to the polls on election day.

“It’s very important for citizens to be able to get out and vote, that’s why we are concentrating our equipment into those areas,” Kennedy said. “We want people to be able to vote. This is a bad thing, but they may have to wait until late today to actually go to the polls.”

Due to the heavy snowfall and winds throughout the weekend, especially Sunday and leading into the night, Kennedy said they are back to priority one and starting from scratch today.

“Our main focus is priority one and the polling stations for now,” Kennedy said. “I’m hoping by the end of the day we’ll be in priority two.”

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The city is working to clear roadways after a heavy snowfall in Prince Albert. (Dawson Thompson/paNOW Staff)

Kennedy said the equipment has not been able to make it to the polling stations this morning as they have been tied up across the city.

“We’re bringing equipment in from different work zones,” Kennedy added. “We have to wait until they clean up some of their areas, then we’ll focus on the polling stations.”

City workers have been clearing the roads all morning. Kennedy added if they need to outsource more help, they will.

“We have all of our equipment out there. We’re bringing in some equipment from the landfill, and we’re using some from Water Works,” Kennedy explained. “We got all the equipment that is available to us at the moment.

“Be patient. This is a big snowfall.”

To find out where your nearest polling station is, click here.

Tow trucks

Tow truck companies in the Prince Albert area have been working non-stop since the snow started to fall on Saturday..

John Medinski at Action Towing estimated they’ve had between 150 and 200 calls in the last 24 hours. He said until crews get the streets cleared, there’s not much point in anyone going out.

“We’ve been pulling people out and you pull them out and about half a block away, they’re stuck again,” he said.

That sentiment was shared by John Bodnarchuk with Dr. John’s Towing.

“People have to learn not to drive because they are getting stuck in the middle of the street and so are we with our tow trucks,” he said.

A photo of a car stuck on 13th St. E. (Nigel Maxwell/ paNOW Staff)

When Bodnarchuk talked to paNOW at 10a.m., he said he had received over 20 calls in five hours including one rollover.

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Dawson.thompson@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: dawsonthompson8