snow plowing

[paul253]

I am asking this question in all seriousness....does Milwaukee even have snowplows anymore? The roads are terrible, its like most haven't even been touched. Even the freeway is bad (which I know the county is in charge of). I am not even talking about side streets... North Ave is horrible. Oakland Ave is even worse. You'd think with all the money this city is sucking out of people with the high taxes that they'd be able to at least clear the streets. And its not like we got 8 inches of snow in an hour, its just been steady. If only we had the technology to predict a snowstorm a few days in advance.....wait......i think we do!

[jaybird2001wi]

paul, I know what you mean. I work in Muskego, just a minute from Hales Corners (like a 10 minute walk to Hwy 100 and Forest Home) and it seemed like every road was terrible today. I work for a private state company in Milwaukee County specializing in group homes. I had to ride along in a company van on Forest Home to 60th St to Burnham to get to the Regional Office for an inservice training session. The van almost skidded into a ditch several times. It was terrible.

I saw plows riding the roads, but they didn't even have the plows down and I didn't see ONE salt truck in use the entire 1 hour I was in the vehicle.

[hawing]

In (partial) defense of the road crews, our recent temperatures are too low for salt to be effective.

[Crazyk1294]

North Ave is horrible. Oakland Ave is even worse.

The problem with the area you describe is the fact that there are cars parked on those tiny streets and it makes it even harder for the plows to do their jobs.

[paul253]

North Ave and Oakland aren't tiny streets. North runs from the Lake all the way to Tosa, and Oakland goes for probably about 5 or 6 miles itself. I'm not talking about those tiny east side streets where cars cant get by, even in the summer time, these are pretty major streets that have barely been touched.

[Minigoon]

I wonder how much of this was city/county workers off because Monday was MLK Holiday? I'm guessing that may have something to do with it. Again, not an excuse, but a possible explaination.

[SmartBall]

True, people complain about the roads, but they also complain about the money it would take to call people in and pay them holiday time to clear the roads. A lot of roads throughout the state were really bad around Christmas time, which is bad because of all the people traveling, but it would have cost municipalities a ton to bring their crews in on Christmas day instead of waiting for the next day. It can be a real tough balancing act.

[Patrick425]

I wonder how much of this was city/county workers off because Monday was MLK Holiday?

I was thinking the same thing when I was driving home yesterday. I think hawings point is very valid as well.

[brewcrew00]

Well the holiday is over, the roads are still terrible, can anyone explain that one now?

[sgtcluels]

I'm not sure how the county worker shifts work, but maybe MLK day goes till the 1st shifters come in. So technically maybe it didn't end till 7am this morning.

 

That or as hawking said the salt wasn't on their side and the counties didn't mobilize enough workforce on the day off.

[burniebrewer]

Will be interesting to see who shows up first on my circle (in Madison) today: the plows, trash collectors or recyclable collectors.

 

If the plows come through first, they're going to be knocking over/plowing in the large tan and green bins which are all out in the street as told to do in our "recyclopedia". If the collection trucks come first, they'll be leaving a trail of bins all over the street right in the line of the plows.

 

As I type, it is answered. The plows are here first and struggling with navigating the maze--lots of backing up beeps being heard.

[hawing]

That or as hawking said the salt wasn't on their side and the counties didn't mobilize enough workforce on the day off.

I feel like I should change my avatar to Stephen Hawking for a day now. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

 

I can only speak for Madison, but here the snow got heavy again after midnight; and it's still too cold here for salt to be effective. Our streets were plowed sometime overnight (including the dead end street our driveway's on - which is (properly) among the city's lowest priorities), but with that much snow and this cold a temp, there is simply a limit to what crews can do.

 

SmartBall is right on to call it a tough balancing act. Public employees and their employers are often damned if they do and damned if they don't. Attempts to save money/resources (by not paying overtime for MLK Day plowing, or saving salt for when it can effectively be laid) leads to complaints that they aren't doing enough. "Going all out," for lack of a better term, leads to complaints from others that they're spending too much.

 

Although there are always some bad apples, most municipalities are doing their best to maintain a balance between reasonable service and reasonable spending. (full disclosure: I'm a public employee, though not involved in road maintenance, and I live next door to someone whose work is related to road maintenance)

[paul253]

If the holiday was the issue, then that doesn't make any sense. DPW workers should be classified under the category as cops and firefighters. It is a job that has to be done in order to keep the public safe. Can you imagine calling the police and have them saying, well.....most of the officers are off today because its Martin Luther King Day, we'll get to it when we can. Cops and firefighters get "holidays off", they just aren't always on the actual holiday. The snowstorm was predicted ahead of time, just like it always is. There is no excuse for this. And let's remember one more thing. ITS MLK DAY!!!! Its not like we're talking about Christmas or thanksgiving here.

[WV Brew]

Try moving to the DC area, where schools are closed on a rumor of snow. I once saw a car with Florida plates on I-66 with totally bald tires with several inches of snow. Obviously obstructing the rest of us who could still move if only he would get out of the way.

[jwill535]

just be lucky you get your roads plowed, here in Oregon(Wi) every road gets plowed first then they go around and do the smaller streets and Cul de Sacs like mine. I have to wait for the neighbor to ram the 4' barrior of snow so i can leave for work.

[Point Beer Is Best]

I live 15 minutes from UWGB. It took me an hour to get there. Cars were in the ditch and acccidents happening all over I-43 and hwy. 41, mainly from people driving too fast on their way to work. The roads that look clear are covered in black ice. It's pretty awesome up here. The wind is causing drifts, which makes things even worse.

[Invader3K]

I don't know why people have to be in such a rush on days like that. If you're late for work, you're late. Employers, at least in my experience, are usually somewhat lenient if the snow is affecting everyone.

[Crazyk1294]

paul253 wrote:

---

North Ave and Oakland aren't tiny streets. North runs from the Lake all the way to Tosa, and Oakland goes for probably about 5 or 6 miles itself. I'm not talking about those tiny east side streets where cars cant get by, even in the summer time, these are pretty major streets that have barely been touched.

 

That's not what I'm saying. They're main streets in that area, but they are still physically small compared to Oklahoma Ave for example. With the volume of traffic on those streets there should be no parking or 15 minute parking during the winter months. The first area that comes to mind for me is the Oakland and Locust neighborhood. Where is the snow supposed to go?

[zachlaka]

I live in Fitchburg right off of Verona RD andNone of the streets were plowed yesterday probably because of the holiday like Hawing said. One of the few reasons my dad moved from Madison to Fitchburg was because Fitchburg plows every street unlike Madison who do only major streets. I left for school (MATC) which is all the way across town for me at 8:05. The roads were not plowed yet nor was the beltline. We were doing 5 miles an hour in every lane. I saw 3 accidents 1 involving 4 cars. I didn't get to my class until 9:25 I had only 5 minutes to spare. I can usually leave at 8 and get to school by 8:40.

 

When I left school at 1 most of the roads were taken care of.

[pitchleague]

oh, yeah. This entire thread is reason enough to stay in Arizona for another 10 years.

 

Of course, ironically, I kind of miss snow and other stuff.

 

but not that much.

[NeedMoreFans]

I have read that in Madison, even though the city has grown in area, there are still the same number of plows on the roads as there were 20 years ago. I think snow removal in Madison is dismal at best. The city is unique, however. First of all, most of the worst plowed roads are on the isthmus. It's hard to plow roads that have cars parked on them all the time, despite snow emergencies. People who live downtown have reduced options for parking, and the roads aren't that wide. What makes it worse is the day after the snowfall when all the cars that were parked in get out, and there is a pile of snow left where no one can park. The city also reduces the amount of salt it uses on the isthmus due to the lakes. Other roads that are miserable are in new subdivisions where the only traffic is residential.

 

Today, there was no reason why E. Wilson downtown wasn't plowed at 7:45. Lots of people who work for the state and the city traverse down E. Wilson to get to work, and it was a sloppy mess. As was John Nolen. I thought it may have been too cold for salt...that was until I got to work and they had salted all of the sidewalks. They sure looked clear to me.

[owbc]

There couldn't have been any salt on the Madison roads today. They were all completely snow covered, despite the sun shining directly on them all day. Even Johnson and University were terrible and there were cars sliding everywhere. They finally got plowed/salted sometime this evening.

[JoeHova]

People are crazy about this. Try living in the Twin Cities. The roads here have 3 inches of caked snow and ice on them for weeks at a time.

 

This type of complaining actually really upsets me. You can't have it both ways. Either taxes will be high so that we can have exemplary city services or taxes will be low and we'll have crap. Add in all the suburban people in this thread complaining about the CITY of Milwaukee and the urge I have is to tell you to move someplace warm. Thanks for taking your tax dollars out of the city so that the budget can be reduced more, and thank you for then complaining about how the city has no money to plow the streets.

 

Plowed streets cost money. The city does not have a category of worker known as "snowplowers". The sanitation workers are charged with that duty, in addition to their regular jobs. Thus, all plowing is over-time because of laws that have been enacted over the years to protect workers from exploitive employers. The workers are professionals who are used to navigating crowded city streets while driving 50 ton trucks, so it wouldn't be feasible to hire a bunch of winos off the street to plow with rusted-out pickup trucks like some suburbs like to do.

 

People are so unrealistic about snow removal. I saw a letter to the editor in the Journal Sentinel last month where some guy was complaining that snow was piled too high at the curb. WHERE IS IT SUPPOSED TO GO!???! Would that idiot really want to have city employees working around the clock through the whole winter to pick up every snowflake and take them all to some snow landfill somewhere? People have to be rational. We live where it snows. Thus, it will sometimes be snowy where we live, despite the best efforts of all involved.

[Invader3K]

I pretty much agree with Joe Hova, though I don't live in the Milwaukee area so I can't really comment. I think all the snow over the past couple months is just putting some people on edge.

[hawing]

some guy was complaining that snow was piled too high at the curb. WHERE IS IT SUPPOSED TO GO!??

 

You know, in mid-December, after Madison's first few snowstorms (I'd say by then the city had seen 20+ inches that month), some piece of snow moving equipment came to our intersection, around midnight, and spent an hour or so dismantling the tall piles at each corner of our intersection. The backup horn on that vehicle was in extremely good working order.

The sleep deprivation that night wasn't so cool, but it was nice to have a place to pile more snow again.