City Crews making final preparations for winter season

Old man winter hasn’t arrived yet in Prince George but that doesn’t mean snow removal crews with the city are resting on their laurels.

The Roads and Fleet department have called back some of their seasonal employees in anticipation of the first snowfall as well as outfitting trucks and organizing traction materials.

Manager, Jordan Wiseman told MyPGNow.com the priority clearing system will stay in place for another year.

“Priority ones and two’s will be 7.5 centimetre snowfall and priority threes will be twelve and we will continue to follow our snow and ice control policies until such a time where we hear different.”

In addition, Wiseman explained how many people are utilized during a winter storm event.

“If it is a full-on snow event, where we reach our thresholds of 12 centimetres, it will be a full compliment of contractors and city staff over a 24-hour period. There could be an excess of 130 people mobilized to help meet our timelines.”

“Just given the enormous amount of precipitation that we have received in the fall, I am not entirely sure that is going to be indicative of the winter we are going to have. Again, it would be business as usual, there is no way to predict snow-fall for any given year we look at each year and try to adjust for that.”

Parking restrictions are in place from October 15 to April 15 of each year to help with snow and ice control operations:

• Priority Ones and the Hospital District – On-street parking is prohibited from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m.
• Downtown – On-street parking is prohibited from 12 a.m. to 7 a.m.
• Residential areas – On-street parking is prohibited from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Parking on the side of the street with odd house numbers is permitted from 6 p.m. to 8 a.m. unless otherwise posted.

Illegally parked vehicles are subject to a $50 ticket per offence and/or may be towed.

• Priority 1 (red) and Priority 2 (green) routes are cleared within 48 hours after snowfall ends if at least 7.5 centimetres of accumulates over 24 hours.
• Priority 3 (grey) routes are cleared within 72 hours after Priority 1 (red) and Priority 2 (green) routes are finished.

In addition to clearing routes, normal winter operations include:

• Gravel road grading
• Vegetation control (slashing, grubbing, chipping overgrown road right-of-ways)
• Pothole maintenance
• Normal snow and ice control
• Snow windrow road widening, ditch maintenance, and exposing drainage catch basins in curb and gutter areas to accommodate melt cycles
• Off-loading of cul-de-sacs and areas prone to flooding
• Expose/off-load curb and gutter areas within the Bowl to expedite winter sand pick-up