WARMAN — The frequent heavy snowstorms this winter have proved to be a massive challenge for the City of Warman’s public works department, which estimates that more than 20,000 metric tonnes of snow have been removed from the community’s streets, lanes and sidewalks so far.
This staggering statistic was presented to city councillors during their Feb. 10 committee of the whole meeting by Director of Infrastructure Adam Coates, along with other figures illustrating how massive the task of snow removal has been.
Coates said an estimated 78 centimetres of light accumulated snow fell on the city between Nov. 20 and Feb. 4. This excludes the snow that fell on Feb. 5 and 6, which likely added another 10 centimetres, he indicated.
The biggest dump came on Nov. 23-24, when an estimated 27 centimetres of snow hit Warman. Coates noted in his report that the entire city was ridged just five and a half days after that huge snowfall.
“The operators took pride in accomplishing their goal of having the city passable by end of the day Friday, Nov. 27,” he said, adding the job was done by noon.
Coates reported the estimated 20,000 metric tonnes of removed snow works out to roughly 2,500 to 3,000 equivalent single-axle end-dump loads of snow.
It is further estimated that the public works department has spent 2,376 regular hours and 312.5 overtime hours moving snow, sanding, salting and maintaining the snow dump from November to the end of January.
He said customer service staff have also done an excellent job logging an estimated 145 calls regarding snow removal and updating the list of problem areas in the city.
Interestingly, about half of these calls — 47 per cent — were from people just wanting the snow to be removed from their street, Coates indicated.
Residents were generally accepting of the centre ridge in residential areas for a few weeks, but as their contracted trucks left, people called to request those ridges be removed even though the streets were passable.
“People just wanted the snow to be removed from their street,” he said.
Ultimately, all priority and residential centre ridges (excluding some cul de sacs with unremovable snow piles) were cleared by Dec.19.
Of the 145 calls received, Coates noted another 10 per cent related to back lanes needing to be cleared, while eight per cent were categorized as “other” and represented a mixed bag of concerns — potential property damage by equipment, sand being spread too far and school bus challenges.
Regarding the problem of too much sand being spread around, Coates said they have advised their operators to be aware of that and “to not dump more sand than what’s actually needed.”
Mayor Gary Philipchuk thanked Coates for putting together a detailed report on snow removal. “It’s summarized, it’s very clear and it gives us a lot of good information for us to discuss with other people,” he said.
