HomeMy WebLinkAboutItem 05.b• Snow and Cold Temperatures
January has been a month
primarily dedicated to snow
removal and ice control.
Public Works and Parks
Maintenance staff were out
roughly every other day in
January to deal with the
many snow events. With 17
snow events over the 31 days
of January and over 18 days
with lows below zero, it
has been tough on staff
and equipment. Almost
1,800 hours were spent
plowing and over 1,400
tons of deicer was applied
to City streets. Many of
the snow events have
been straightforward in that
crews have been able to go
out and plow, clean up after
the event, and be done with
it. The last few events have
been such that crews were
out additional times to deal
with blowing and drifting
snow, tackling tall snow drifts
and hard packed snow and
ice.
LAKEVILLE PUBLIC WORKS
Christopher Petree, Director
January 2014
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Downtown Snow Removal.
The amount of snow
throughout January, especially
over the last 10 days of the
month required that crews do a
special cleanup of the
downtown area. Normally, they
would plow snow to the center
of Holyoke Avenue and use the
large snow blower to load
trucks. It is a quick and easy
method that rapidly cycles
the trucks through the
downtown area. However,
during cleanup, the snow
blower failed and staff were
forced to revert to the old
method of filling the trucks
using the loaders. It's a bit
more time consuming, but
just as effective. The
downtown cleanup takes
about four hours from 210th
Street to 202nd Street along
Holyoke Avenue.
Dealing with Intersections.
The accumulation of snow and
subsequent plowing also creates
problems at intersections as
large snow piles decrease the
sight lines for motorists. In those
cases, the large snow blower has
been a tremendous asset in
removing the hardened snow
piles from around turn lanes and
at intersections. The Streets
Division's goal is to provide the
safest and best possible driving
surface to motorists.
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