There will be no phase 2 parking ban during this round of snow removal as the city\u2019s use of extra contractors has cleared much of the major roadways and residential streets are not as buried as initial weather reports predicted they would be.<\/p>\n
An update on the city\u2019s efforts to clear streets of snow dropped by a polar vortex last weekend was provided by city staff at 12:30 p.m. Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cCurrent snowpack readings from the driving lanes are averaging four to five centimetres city-wide,\u201d said Infrastructure field operations supervisor Valerie Dacyk. \u201cIn order to minimize impact on residents but provide a service to residential roads, we will be completing a grooming cycle over the next 10 to 14 days.<\/p>\n
\u201cTruck plows using special ice blades will attend to every residential road. They will flatten the snowpack and minimize rutting by using these blades in this area. This technique also provides additional traction by scratching up the ice and snowpack. Sand is also applied at the entrances and intersections of residential roads.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dacyk said crews would begin clearing alleyways during the weekend before moving on to residential streets. While no parking ban will be enforced this time, she noted residents could accelerate the process by making sure they aren\u2019t parked on the roads.<\/p>\n
After widespread public outcry over the Christmas holiday dumping of 72 cm of snow, which took nearly three weeks to dig out and resulted in reports of residents who ignored parking bans attacking snow plows with shovels, city officials are determined to prevent a similar outburst. Consequentially, even before the snow stopped the city contracted 100 private contractors to assist the city\u2019s fleet of graders in clearing the main roads. Crews have been working 24 hours a day, seven days a week to ensure the roads are clear for Edmonton commuters.<\/p>\n
A phase 1 parking ban kicked in Wednesday morning. The surge appears to have worked \u2014 by Wednesday afternoon city officials said upwards of 70 per cent of the main roadways and 60 per cent of the active pathways had been cleared. Dacyk said, since then, the city has now cleared out 72 per cent of priority two roads \u2014 those being the remaining freeways, bus routes, arterial roadways, business districts, collector roadways, and transit park and ride access roads \u2014 and 73 per cent of the city\u2019s active winter priority bike loop has been cleared for those who rely on human power to get around.<\/p>\n
Dacyk said the additional contractors would not be employed to clear residential roads. She noted initial predictions of up to 30 cm of snow did not come to fruition \u2014 across the city Edmontonians were blanketed with 22 cm of snow on average.<\/p>\n
While there have been some violations of the phase 1 parking ban, she said co-operation with snow removal crews has been better than at the start of the year. No incidents of violent attacks on city vehicles have been reported this round, though Dacyk noted those incidents last time were during residential plowing and not in the main streets.<\/p>\n
Dacyk said, weather permitting, at the current pace the phase one parking ban should be rescinded by the end of the weekend.<\/p>\n
No estimate on the costs of the additional 100 contractors for this snow removal is available at this time, though that information would be available by the end of season. Dacyk said if the city anticipates another potential 30-plus cm dump of snow, additional contractors would be called in again to expedite the snow clearing process.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe thank all the residents that are working with us to let us pass by with our trucks and graders,\u201d she said. \u201cPlease do not park on main roadways, arterials or bus routes.<\/p>\n
\u201cKeep an eye out for equipment and give them room to work.\u201d<\/p>\n
ebowling@postmedia.com<\/a><\/p>\n Related<\/p>\n Bookmark our website and support our journalism: Don\u2019t miss the news you need to know \u2014 add EdmontonJournal.com<\/a> and EdmontonSun.com<\/a> to your bookmarks and sign up for our newsletters here.<\/a><\/p>\n You can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber. Subscribers gain unlimited access to The Edmonton Journal, Edmonton Sun, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Edmonton Journal<\/a> | The Edmonton Sun.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There will be no phase 2 parking ban during this round of snow removal as the city\u2019s use…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":489159,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,196663,23752,194741,196664,196661,196662,196660,178940,194740],"class_list":{"0":"post-489158","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edmonton","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-city-officials","11":"tag-edmonton","12":"tag-parking-ban","13":"tag-residential-road","14":"tag-residential-roads","15":"tag-residential-streets","16":"tag-snow-plows","17":"tag-snow-removal","18":"tag-valerie-dacyk"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=489158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489158\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/489159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=489158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=489158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=489158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}