I heard on NPR that our Major gave himself a B grade in response to the snow storm. I wonder if this grade from one of the schools that do not meet the National standards. I am one of those unfortunate health care worker that has to be either on the road or use the buses to get to work since people need me no matter what the weather happens to be. Tried to get on the bus but they were not running; thank God I own one of those hated SUV’s since the city decided to make the roads semi adequate for us to get around. Lots of my coworkers were not as lucky; they had to spend the night at work. It is more than an inconvenience when essential workers are not able to get to work and replace the ones locked in due to the conditions. You can not run a city in this manner; I am just asking for the major to use his critical thinking skills. He is getting his salary from us; the city needs to keep moving. Peace.
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Kind of what I imagine driving along a muddy road in Zimbabwe would feel like. Only worse.
Dawggy, this isn’t like you. Looking for civic handouts? What happened to the self-reliant, small-government guy we all know and love? Did that branch hit you in the head?
Sunnyside, thanks for making the effort to get to work and sorry to hear about your colleagues who were stuck. Any examples where essential services weren’t available? I don’t know of any. Didn’t hear a single story. Maybe they’re out there.
And he was driving a snow plow down 12th around 12:30pm this afternoon. We are finally seeing real pavement for the first time in nearly a week.
PS: Road clearing is a 3 vehicle job. In front, a little SDOT car, 2nd a plowing truck and then a 3rd truck (maybe for sanding). Beware of big gray mounds of snow/slush in their wake…
I don’t think that we can give a grade yet. In the next few days, we’ll find out what the human and financial costs have really been, and whether the folks in charge can learn for the next time.
Example: will the city, the county, and the state develop a plan to
1) specify the corridors that need priority plowing (such as streets leading to hospitals, community centers, and grocery stores),
2) deploy the needed resources to keep those corridors clear,
3) deploy buses to serve those corridors, and
4) coordinate between agencies to make these things happen and communicate them to the public?
Let’s hope so. If these things happen the next time, then we can finalize the grade.
WTF are you talking about J? All that thin air must have you dizzy.
The roads around hospitals were priority this time around already. Maybe not bare pavement like many have been dreaming of, but it was on the list already.
Who cares about the millions of dollars in wages, sales, services and taxes that have been lost the past six days when 2 million people are left snowbound?
Who cares about the missed hospital treatments and operations and emergency dental work?
The doctor’s prescriptions for critical medicines that could not be obtained?
The cancelled cultural events and meetings?
The impossibility of car and bus travel? Of getting to the airport?
Who cares that we had stuff to do?
What matters is we didn’t have any salt runoff into Puget Sound, which is already full of salt water.
and that this is not typical for Seattle, I think the city did a fine job.
22 of my patients were unable to get to my office due to bad road conditions. I agree with Cliff Mass’ post from yesterday.
“… if I was the “snow czar” this is what I would do:
1. Acquire and be ready to use salt on the roads.
2. Triple the number of snowplows and use steel blades instead of the rubber ones. These units can be placed on city trucks. If necessary, contract with the private sector for more equipment, as they do in the eastern U.S. for snow emergencies.
3. Change the snow removal strategy to the immediate removal of snow off primary and secondary roads so we don’t end up with thick, chunky ice we have today. Don’t let it accumulate and freeze.
4. Work with Metro to establish a rational snow strategy. This would include moving buses to routes where they won’t be endangered until the roads are cleared. Thus, you don’t take so many buses off the roads or abandon them, but redirect them strategically before they get stuck. Have MORE buses on some routes (such as major routes in and out of downtown).
5. Make sure Metro’s online bus tracker web pages are robust enough to handle the load. It is critical that the population knows where the buses in real time. We have the technology to do this–they just haven’t sized their computer servers properly. And the bus tracker software should be made more prominent…not hidden as the current approach.”
I am feeling betrayed by my City – that the definition of cleared streets is that a 4-wheel drive vehicle or a vehicle with chains can navigate them. This definition odes not meet the needs of the majority of our fine citizens. Heck, it doesn’t even work for the police cars.
Oh, yeah, heck of a job, Nickels.
I think people need to define their terms and think through what they’re asking for. Snow plowing does not remove a single flake of snow from the street, it just moves it from one part of the street to another. Snow removal doesn’t use snow plows, it uses front end loaders and dump trucks. Now where should we dump all that removed snow? NIMBY!!! If the snow plows scrapped down to bare pavement, there would be banks of snow many feet high occupying the outside lanes of the streets. Now, where to park all the cars, oh yeah, they were parked there already so now they are either buried or blocked in behind a wall of snow unable to get out onto the pristine street lane.
On 1st Ave S where I work, the street had been plowed as it’s a major route. This meant that people could drive by on bare lanes but had no where to park in front of my business because of the pile of plowed snow. So we closed early and stayed closed, hoping it melts soon.
Oh, and how exactly are we supposed to pay for all these snow plows, there storage, maintenance, operators, etc that we only really may need once every 15 to 20 years? I’d rather not have higher taxes and walk to work occasionally and if I live to far from work to walk, suck it up.
Nickels is so far into PR-spin mode that he’s giving his administration their grade before the job is even done. That’s a sure sign he knows they’ve fucked up and he’s trying to head off the inevitable backlash.
Here is my prediction: the city will spend a bunch of money on salt and plows this year. We won’t use them next year. Or the year after. And in about 10 years we’ll have a budget crunch at which point we’ll ask ourselves “why the heck are we spending so much money on snow removal equipment when it barely snows here anyways?” And we’ll cut it. (Devo is right).
My take: life is tough sometimes and if we gear up for every inconvenience we could conceivably have, we’ll end up taxing ourselves into poverty. I guarantee that money would be better spent on earthquake readiness.
It sucks that hospital workers couldn’t make it in, but sometimes shit happens and you have to deal with it – either by driving your SUV or spending the night or walking. Get over it. I drove my little Civic to downtown and back nearly every day of the storm and, while I had to drive out of my way to avoid the nasty hills and slid around a bit, I was perfectly fine.
I’d rather have the city needs to take money we’d spend on plows and pay for driving lessons for whiners who didn’t want to drive or couldn’t figure out how to drive on the lumpy packed snow and little gold stars for every self-righteous SUV owner who proudly (and aggressively) drove around through the storm.
We forget and by next election, no one runs against him. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
The city doesn’t want to spend money on salt and plows, but consider all the indirect costs of not clearing the streets: people sliding into stop signs, damaged parking meters, damaged cop cars, damaged buses, and sand-clogged sewers. And lots of lost revenue from sales tax since people couldn’t get out to shop. And personal costs from accidents, insurance rates, lost wages, etc. The indirect costs are huge.
I was outraged when I heard Nickels gave the city a B for snow response. Perfect example of an out-of-touch politician. If he loses his reelection, I think we will remember this storm as the nail in the coffin. Someone already wrote his opponent’s slogan: DON’T GET STUCK WITH NICKELS.
One more thing… tire chains chew up the roads so they need repaving more often.
I agree. They worked with what they had on hand and provided basic services for everyone. People need to set realistic expectations. One example: if we use steel plows without the rubberized strip on the bottom, we would have to pay more for street repairs, causing more construction during summer months, more taxes, and it would increase complaints.
Hospitals were staffed though, with enough help from car dealerships, city and private fleets to ensure that enough staff made it in to handle emergencies.
I really agree with this: “life is tough sometimes and if we gear up for every inconvenience we could conceivably have, we’ll end up taxing ourselves into poverty.”
Using plows directly on our streets tear up the roads more than snow chains.
I don’t mind if we stock up for another Snowpocalypse in 2009, even if there is no huge snow in 2009. Rock salt won’t go bad if it sits in storage for a year, or two, or 10.
Freeze -> Thaw cycles cause potholes, which are more damage than snow plows and chains combined.
I’ve never heard more whining about how much steel bladed plows hurt the roads. Seriously? Check out the snow removal equipment other places. They city’s plows fall under the ‘consumer’ category. The city should get some real equipment to deal with this (normal) events.