Calgary snow route parking ban: nearly 1,500 tickets issued on Day 1

Hundreds of Calgary drivers have received tickets after leaving their vehicles parked on a snow route during the first day of the city’s recent ban.

The Calgary Parking Authority (CPA) said as of 4 p.m. Tuesday, 1482 tickets had been issued and 11 vehicles towed since the snow route parking ban began at 6 p.m. on Monday.

The tickets were issued by 25 CPA officers who were on duty during that time.

READ MORE: Snow route parking ban in effect in Calgary

“Our officers are driving around, looking for cars that are parked on roads ahead of the plows and they’re not finding as many cars as they thought they might see out there,” CPA general manager Mike Derbyshire said.

According to the CPA, parking tickets issued for those who don’t move their vehicle are $40 if paid within 10 days, but climb to $75 if not paid within 30 days.

If your vehicle is towed, the CPA said it will cost you a minimum of $100.

“Although technically…once the road has been cleared, you’re probably OK, but the ban is still in effect, so if it were me in my area, I wouldn’t want to park on a road even if it has been plowed,” Derbyshire added.

The snow route parking ban issued on Monday is the first in Calgary in three years.

Snow routes are located on major roadways, collector roads and most bus routes and can be identified by blue signs with a white snowflake.

Bans can last for up to 72 hours.

Calgary has seen between 15 to 26 centimetres of snow accumulate in the past few days, according to Environment Canada’s Alberta weather summary issued on Feb. 6.

In the meantime, the city’s Roads department says crews are making progress clearing snow.

WATCH: Clearing the snow in Calgary has been a major job, as Gary Bobrovitz reports, city crews and auto body shops have been working hard.

1:36 Winter storm keeps Calgary auto body shops, snow plows busy

A spokesperson said by noon Tuesday, it had cleared about 80% of priority one routes, and would be tackling priority 2 routes next.

“The faster we can get through those roads the sooner we can get to residential roads,” said Brittany Kustra, a spokesperson for the City of Calgary Roads Department.

Kustra said in some cases, crews would be removing snow, instead of just clearing it.

And although it stopped snowing, slippery roads continued to wreak havoc on city streets.

Between 4 a.m. and 4 p.m. Tuesday there were 260 crashes reported to police.  Of those, seven were injury collisions, and 32 were hit and runs.

With files from Global’s Tony Tighe and Gary Bobrovitz