[thommyjo]

The current budget is only enough for the city to hire five temporary bylaw officers (and a clerk) every winter to enforce parking bans. During the funding spike in 2022 or thereabouts, that went up to 15 officers (and two clerks) who also enforced the spring parking bans. Crucially, when there was no active winter parking ban, they conducted proactive sidewalk enforcement.

The current five (who will lose their jobs come spring time, as is tradition) probably do proactive sidewalk enforcement when there's no bans, but they have a heck of a lot of ground to cover.

Here's their jurisdiction scan, for anyone curious. It includes Stockholm, Sweden. Take note of the differences in population, city area, population density, and average precipitation between Edmonton and Stockholm.

I have a lot of questions about this report. Ottawa does sidewalks and roads for 82 million, and they get more snow than us.

We spent 60mil and admin claims we’d have to spend 220m MORE to also do sidewalks?

Yet we have less snowfall and arguably our clearing is already way worse than Ottawa just for roads.

Make it make sense.

 

[kcantor]

I have a lot of questions about this report. Ottawa does sidewalks and roads for 82 million, and they get more snow than us.

We spent 60mil and admin claims we’d have to spend 220m MORE to also do sidewalks?

Yet we have less snowfall and arguably our clearing is already way worse than Ottawa just for roads.

Make it make sense.

I can’t comment on sidewalks but Edmonton has approximately 10,000 lane kilometers of roads while Ottawa has approximately 6,000.

 

[CplKlinger]

I have a lot of questions about this report. Ottawa does sidewalks and roads for 82 million, and they get more snow than us.

We spent 60mil and admin claims we’d have to spend 220m MORE to also do sidewalks?

Yet we have less snowfall and arguably our clearing is already way worse than Ottawa just for roads.

Make it make sense.

Dang, I'm jealous ;-;

Can we at least have corn fences?? I hate corn but that sounds fun.

 

[CplKlinger]

I can’t comment on sidewalks but Edmonton has approximately 10,000 lane kilometers of roads while Ottawa has approximately 6,000.

That's my big gripe with the J-scan; it lists the area of each city, but now their lane KMs of roadway.

 

[IanO]

99 Avenue from 106-109 is still not done and neither is 109st from 100-99ave.

In your CAPITAL city next to your home of government where you currently do not have two turn lanes into and out of it because of windrows.

It's beyond perplexing.

 

[David A]

It was fully cleared south of Jasper along Shoppers and the Milner where 0 business entrances front...

FFS

They have a bus stop and I think some of the snow clearing was done by the building If it was only left to the city, well it would probably be a mess like elsewhere.

 

[thommyjo]

I can’t comment on sidewalks but Edmonton has approximately 10,000 lane kilometers of roads while Ottawa has approximately 6,000.

Totally. That would suggest more expensive for us, but in the “more expensive” side for Ottawa you have:

- 60% more snow
- Significantly faster
- removal of windrows
- sidewalks.

Hard to see their budget only being 50% more than us but seemingly waaaay more and better service. I’m sure lane kms is a big factor, but saying sidewalks will push us to a 300 million dollars budget, more than 3x Ottawa’s seems insane. Especially when that’s still 5-10 day service levels for many of our arterials and MUPs and theirs is 24-48hrs essentially.

 

[thommyjo]

Glad that Edgemont will be completed before Whikwentowin or Garneau. You know, central areas with thousands of residents on some blocks, dozens of businesses, major university.

 

[Airboy]

OK driving through downtown and area yesterday. THERE SHOULD BE NO WINDROWS Left at this point. The Government precinct is a mess and should not have snow piles there at all. Went by the Italian centre and the street corners are dangerous for pedestrians. and God forbit if you have a wheelchair. Around the Strathcona Market and Downtown are virtually impossible to navigate. My wife said if she didn't have me to help she would not be able to go anywhere.

 

[thommyjo]

^
You mean central areas like Whikwentowin and Garneau with grid streets and multiple closely spaced arterials and numerous bus routes that all get cleared before any residential neighborhoods are done??

Are you suggesting the central areas “get enough” snow clearing already and therefore it’s ok that not evenly fully built out communities get cleared first?

If you’ve driven around Whikwentowin at all, with 10x the density of edgemont, you’d see how much more deserving of snow clearing they are. Not just for the drivers, but accessing transit or walking is a nightmare there right now due to intersections.

I’m not sure there’s any objective measure to justify edgemont being cleared before Whikwentowin other than a stupid “rotation of order” that the city likes to claim is “fair”.

Same reason parts of downtown didn’t have gravel swept in late May for playoff parties, but good news, Stillwater is clean!! (Except for all the new gravel and mud from all the homes still under construction there… )

 

[TAS]

Wow - the new Edmonton Method like Vancouver?

 

[The_Cat]

This weather is nice. I've been able to clear most of the remaining snow off the driveway.

 

[Gronk!]

No tows as the snow goes: city runs out of money to tow vehicles during residential parking ban

With Phase 2 of Edmonton’s parking ban underway, residents who don’t move their vehicles won’t need to worry about getting towed, but could still see a $250 ticket on their windshield.

www.ctvnews.ca

 

[johnnyboy]

Are you suggesting the central areas “get enough” snow clearing already and therefore it’s ok that not evenly fully built out communities get cleared first?

If you’ve driven around Whikwentowin at all, with 10x the density of edgemont, you’d see how much more deserving of snow clearing they are. Not just for the drivers, but accessing transit or walking is a nightmare there right now due to intersections.

I’m not sure there’s any objective measure to justify edgemont being cleared before Whikwentowin other than a stupid “rotation of order” that the city likes to claim is “fair”.

Same reason parts of downtown didn’t have gravel swept in late May for playoff parties, but good news, Stillwater is clean!! (Except for all the new gravel and mud from all the homes still under construction there… )

The Snow & Ice Control Program did a Reddit AMA today. Their response to a similar question was:

"This year neighbourhoods with boulevards are being cleared first to facilitate windrow placement due to the warm weather, after that they will be cleared geographically from equipment dispatch locations."

 

[thommyjo]

The Snow & Ice Control Program did a Reddit AMA today. Their response to a similar question was:

"This year neighbourhoods with boulevards are being cleared first to facilitate windrow placement due to the warm weather, after that they will be cleared geographically from equipment dispatch locations."

So not the most strategic per usual. Good.

You’d think the number of people who benefit from X road being cleared would drive the logic. If it takes equal time to clear 10 blocks for 300 houses or 10 blocks for 4000 residents plus a few hundred daily patrons of businesses, you’d think the later gets you the best ROI…