By Thia James

POLL: One more big snowfall means snow emergency: Mayor

Jan 28, 2013 | 8:26 PM

With more snow forecasted to fall later this week, Mayor Greg Dionne is now warning residents that a snow emergency could be looming.

“We have a major issue with snow, by the sounds of it this Friday we’re going to get some more snow, and we’re really not into the snow season yet, and we’ve had record snowfalls,” Dionne said.

Before adjourning Monday night’s City Council meeting, Dionne broke the fourth wall of council chambers to address the public directly. Within his general warning about the city’s capacity to handle the record snowfall was a specific warning: snow may be pushed into the outer lanes along arterial roads.

“One of the ideas we’re looking at – just so the residents realize how desperate the snow situation is – if we get one more large snowfall, then we are going to look at closing one side of the street,” Dionne said. “Whether it’s going to be the odd or the even side, we will not allow parking, and that’s where we’re going to push the snow.”

This also ensures that the sidewalks will be cleared for pedestrians and snow will not be plowed there. He said the City will have a plan within the next 10 days to two weeks that it will make public after it is reviewed by council.

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“We’re soon going to be in an emergency situation with our snowfall,” the mayor said. Another 10 to 15 centimetres of snow will be a “major issue” for the community, he added.

City manager Robert Cotterill said that the City is concerned about the quantity of snow that has fallen, where it can store the snow and preparing for the eventual thaw. Cotterill has instructed his staff to look for “alternative ways” to continue to plow the streets and for short-term storage. They will also be looking to remove snow from the areas that they are able to that could experience flooding in the spring.

“I’ve also spoken to Council about the costs of doing that and some alternatives that we’ll have to bring forward once we have a plan,” he said.

The snow push

Director of Public Works Colin Innes said the city has seen so much snowfall that it’s running out of places to put the snow. He said residents will be able to relate to that, with snow piled up around their driveways.

The city is experiencing the same thing, but it’s along all of the roadways, Innes said.

“What we’ve got to do is take a look at a couple of areas where we’ve got an awful lot of snow and figure out what’s going to be the best means of managing that snow,” he said. “In some cases, it could be a removal of some of it, in other cases it could be just how we push it and get it all off to one side,” he said and added they will have to look at all of the measures and choose the one that’s most appropriate for taking care of the snow.

Innes said that when there’s a snow push, what typically happens is that parking along one side of the street is lost. He said there are a number of municipalities that use this and they alternate which side of the street the snow will be pushed to each year.

“We’ll have to take a look and see if that’s appropriate or where we really figure we’re going to need that, and really it’s at the cost of parking on one side of the street,” he said. This is easier than turning streets into one-way streets, which would get complicated with signage, Innes said.

This doesn’t mean the snow routes aren’t working, Innes said, since the major roads are pretty much clean. The residential roads currently present the biggest challenge.

What residents can do

Dionne also outlined what residents themselves can do to prevent flooding around their houses once the snow begins to melt.

“I know some residents now have already started to shovel snow away from the building because it all depends on how quick the thaw happens, what’s going to happen to the snow,” he said. “If it’s a slow thaw, we may get away with it. But if it’s a quick thaw, I don’t want to live in the RMs.”

“But we’re going to have issues within our city,” Dionne said.

As for flood prevention, Innes said the City goes around each year, usually during March to remove snow from areas. “We found if you leave it there, that’s where you’re inviting problems. You may be fortunate, and if you get a very gentle melt that the system’s able to handle it, and that you don’t have any flooding, but you could also have it be a year where all of a sudden the temperature will just spike and you have all kinds of flooding,” Innes said.

The case for the snow push

If there’s another major snowfall, Dionne requested that citizens be patient and pay attention to the news, because the emergency plan that includes snow being plowed to one side of the street may need to be implemented.

“We’re going to let the public know well in advance so they can get their vehicles out of the way,” he said. “And unfortunately, if anyone has a better idea or plan, and removing it is not cost efficient. We don’t have enough loaders and dump trucks to remove the snow that we have accumulated. We’re going to have to dispatch those units into flood areas, to see if we can deal with flooding in the spring that will come if the snow melt happens.”

He asked once again for the public’s patience, acknowledging that it will be inconveniencing citizens with the snow push that would eliminate lanes. “Unfortunately there’s nothing we can do, we just have to do that.”