City of Edmonton says more equipment, better service coming to snow removal this season

The City of Edmonton says more equipment will be on the roads this winter to help clear snow and ice more effectively.

On Thursday morning, city officials outlined Edmonton’s plans for snow and ice removal for the upcoming season.

The city said additional funding approved by council earlier this year will lead to improvements, with more equipment on the roads to clear areas more quickly following a snowfall.

The city said this year, it will pick up collected snow around school zones more often, conduct residential maintenance more frequently and provide three additional supplier-filled sandbox sites for public use.

The city will not plow down to bare pavement in residential areas this season. The goal is to reduce the size of windrows in residential areas, as well as blocked catch basins, both of which were problems in Edmonton last season.

“Large windrows are not what Edmontonians want to expect this winter. So we’ve adjusted,” said Craig McKeown, branch manager of the city’s parks and roads service. “We’ve listened and adjusted and will be reverting back to that grooming of the five-centimetre snowpack and we anticipate that will alleviate a lot of issues this winter.

“We’ve heard some of the feedback — windrows, catch basins, flooding, ponding, water drainage issues — so we intend to maximize our equipment utilization, increase the amount of crews that are out on the road, access that inventory faster. So, have crews out more often, more crews out there clearing snow in larger areas more quickly.”

The city will also rely on enforcement this year, committing to ticketing and towing vehicles not obeying seasonal parking bans. Currently, drivers could be fined $100 for infractions. However, changes to the traffic bylaw are on the agenda to be discussed at an upcoming council meeting, which could increase the fine to $250.

“Snow removal is a shared responsibility and when vehicles are parked in areas that crews come to clear, it means a reduction in the effectiveness of the snow removal,” said Valerie Dacyk, general supervisor of infrastructure field operations.

A new parking ban notification tool is being offered this year. Edmontonians can sign up to receive text or email messages ahead of road clearing in specific areas of the city. Once crews are done in the area, another notification will be sent to the person. Anyone who previously received notifications from the city will have to sign up for the new system.

An additional $4.7 million has been added to the snow removal budget this season, but city road crews say it’s not enough to get them where they want to be in terms of timely snow removal. McKeown said on average, Edmontonians can expect Priority 1 roadways to be cleared within four days of a snowfall, when the goal is about 36 hours.

City road crews will be before council during budget deliberations later this year asking for more money for snow removal. It will be up to council to decide whether more money is allocated to the task.

Nakota Isga Ward Coun. Andrew Knack believes there’s an appetite from the public and council to allocate more money to the service.

“Quite clearly there’s a demand from the public’s front, but also I think from council because we spent this last year really digging into the why we haven’t been hitting the goals that I think so many of us expect,” Knack said.

“We have a lot of equipment that doesn’t have people running that equipment,” he continued. “At the same time, we’ve seen our roadway inventory grow close to 20 per cent in just a short number of years.

“If your budget hasn’t changed, your roadway network has increased and you don’t have enough people to run all the equipment, guess what? We’re not going to be doing the job that any of us really expect.”

Knack said Edmonton is not where it needs to be when it comes to snow removal, and the city is not producing the safety Edmontonians expect on the roads.

pihêsiwin Ward Coun. Tim Cartmell believes snow removal will be better this year than last year, but admits he’s “not sure we’re all the way to good yet.”

“I think the appetite is going to be for more spending, for more service, for better service,” Cartmell said. “But not necessarily an appetite for increased taxes to support that.”

He said he would like to see what the city can do with “a few dollars before we get into lots of dollars.”

The changes to the snow removal policy come after a challenging season for road crews last year, which saw several freezing rain events within a short time period, followed by immediate and extended periods of extreme cold. The drastic weather shifts resulted in compacted, thick ice that was difficult to remove.

During any given snow event last winter, the city received anywhere from 100 to 300 notifications per day, in addition to councillor inquiries.

“Every tactic has its tradeoffs,” McKeown said. “Whether there’s grooming residential neighbourhoods to a five-centimetre snowpack or blading to bare pavement, there’s tradeoffs and pros and cons to each approach.

“Last year was a particularly interesting winter when it came to the climate we experienced. In addition to that, we bladed to bare pavement and we heard it loud and clear from Edmontonians that those tradeoffs were not ideal.”

Dacyk said it’s hoped the increased grooming in residential neighbourhoods will help keep big ruts from forming in the streets.

Earlier this year, a review of the city’s snow-removal program found there was insufficient resources and equipment to meet the majority of current service levels outlines in the policy.

1:39 Edmonton city council examining snow removal strategy

The city also announced Thursday its “Name a Plow” contest, which will see names assigned to five snow plows in the city.

“The prize is, if you win, you’ll see the name that you’ve entered onto the website… decaled on the vehicle. So you’ll be able to see your plow that you named clearing snow across Edmonton,” McKeown said.

Edmontonians are invited to submit their most creative names online.