Neighbourhood snow removal tentatively scheduled for next week

As crews work to clear arterial roads, the City of Edmonton is ending phase 1 of its parking ban. CTV News Edmonton’s Evan Kenny has more.

Residential neighbourhoods won’t be bladed until next week, weather permitting.

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The next five days will be dedicated to finishing cleaning top-priority roads, areas hosting New Year’s Eve festivities, and business improvement areas, including removing windrows spilling into driving lanes and sidewalks by more than half a metre, said Val Dacyk, the city’s general supervisor of field operations, parks and road services, on Tuesday.

“When we’re receiving heavy snowfalls – especially this winter – repeatedly and ongoing, we just haven’t had the opportunity to go into residentials because we’re trying to keep those mains and those highways safe,” she said.

A new snow event in the middle of crews removing snow from top-priority routes means they have to start over.

“We are aware that the residentials need some service at this point in time. We are balancing that with the priority that the main roadways need,” Dacyk said when asked about the ruts on residential streets.

“We are getting rid of the safety concerns in the priority areas and as soon as that is complete, we will be going into residentials. We can’t do it right now because anybody who’s driven downtown knows that we have some centre stacks that are impacting travel.”

She says for 20 days, all available personnel and equipment have been clearing snow from the city’s 12,000 kilometres of roads and 500 kilometres of active pathways.

The winter has counted 72 centimetres of snow, higher than the 47 counted by this time last year, and approaching last season’s total of 107 centimetres.

The Phase 1 parking ban currently in effect is scheduled to end Wednesday.

When a residential parking ban takes effect, it is expected to last about two weeks.

Dacyk stressed the importance of Edmontonians complying with parking bans to safe and efficient snow clearing. Although some tickets have been issued this season, the city said total enforcement data was unavailable until Wednesday.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Galen McDougall and Evan Kenny