If you’ve just been snowed in here in
Even if you have seen them before, the drivers, their equipment and the job they do (so you don’t have to) are a treat to behold.
Craig Morton, manager of roads for the city of
The city is currently using trackless models of the vehicles “specifically designed to plow and sand sidewalks.
Now, when rolling down most sidewalks, the main challenge is to avoid getting any of this sand on what will emerge after the winter as grass.
“Operators do their best,” according to Morton, “to minimize sod damage, but this is a difficult task with little or no room for driver error.”
The task becomes more difficult, he adds, “when there is a cover of snow making it difficult to determine the location of the edge of sidewalk. This is especially true during the first few snowfalls or after a thaw when there are no snow banks that can be used as a guide.”
With last week’s snow squalls throughout Barrie and Simcoe Country, plows were at it in earnest last Wednesday, cleaning off what the city deems primary sidewalks Contractor units were in through the night and … (continued) plowing and sanding operations,” while what are considered secondary sidewalks were worked on a short time later, so that pedestrians could freely move around as early as 4 a.m.
Five centimetres of snow on the sidewalks is judged to be “the approximate level of fallen snow for road crews to be deployed,” where as, on secondary sidewalks, eight centimetres is considered “approximate level of fallen snow for road crews to be deployed”. The sidewalks are maintained in a “snow-packed condition.”
Morton says sod damage is minimized, but “weather conditions are a large contributing factor to the extent of sod damage as well. When weather is cold enough to freeze, the sod will sustain minimal damage if the plow veers off track. The city does take responsibility for sod damage and repairs are carried out in the spring as required.”
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