Let's talk about snow

The recent snow storms in Calgary has brought with it the inevitable discussions about snow removal in this city. What's the big deal? Well, Calgary has a rather unique approach to snow removal (for a Canadian city) - they don't clear the streets of snow. At least not all of them. Only the major roads get plowed (based on vehicle density), the side streets typically do not, unless they are part of a bus route. The picture shows a small portion of the city with the red routes being priority and the blue representing problem areas that get done next. But as you can see, the uncoloured streets are not part of the road clearing plan.

Now in the City's defence, this saves taxpayers huge amounts of money - in 2008 our budget for snow removal was only $21 million. Compare that to Edmonton's $49 mil; Ottawa and Toronto's $67 mil; and Montreal's $128 mil. How do we manage? We cheat. Unlike most other Canadian cities, where once the snow falls, it stays for the rest of the winter, in Calgary we often get treated to thaws and Chinook winds. This coupled with the fact that huge dumps of snow in one event are fairly rare in the city, has enabled us to get by with minimal effort compared to other places. But is it enough?

When the snow just leaves a dusting, or the next thaw arrives to melt the snow within days of its accumulation, it's no big deal. But when storms such as Friday's hit the city, the resources available don't seem capable of keeping up. I mean, I grew up in the outskirts of Montreal and as soon as the snow flies, there's an armada of plows and sanders out attacking the roads. Yesterday, I saw whole streets and freeway on-ramps littered with vehicles because they couldn't get through the snow drifts.

My point is that this kind of thing doesn't happen very often, but when it does, we seem ill equipped to deal with it. So I think it's time to significantly increase the budget. Meteorologists seem to concur that our weather patterns are going to get more erratic and more extreme, not more stable, as time goes on. Which I interpret as meaning that what we experienced on Friday will happen more often, not less.