Front Porches

 One of the things the snow showed was how little use a lot of front doors get.  I saw houses a week after the snow still with front steps and sidewalks unshoveled and, in many of those cases, not even footprints coming out and going down the steps. It just shows how much of our lives come out of the back door and head for the car.

Sidewalks

 Still noticing a whole lot of sidewalks uncleared over a week after the snow. At this rate, they will all be melted clear before anyone gets out to shovel them.

Snow

 Kudos to the city for getting the streets cleared.  I heard from several people that even the side streets, which have been bypassed during the past few snows, got cleared.  Even the alley running paralel  to North Oakland, which has never been plowed in the 20 yars I have lived there, got plowed this time. 

Sidewalks

 

I see the city expects sidewalks cleared by the end of tomorow. I have seen street adjacent sidewalks with 2 feet of snow piled on top of them from the plows. This in addition to the 6 to 9 inches of snow that fell last weekend. Even the city sidewalk on the east side of the civic center parking lot has not been cleared yet. Couple that with a week's worth of below zero temperatures adn it is no wonder most sidewalks have not been cleared. Hope city government sends out another notice giving people another week until the weather has warmed a bit and the heaviest snowfall in 25 years has a chance to melt.

Plowed Streets Map

 Councilperson Roberts put together this map showing which streets in Carbondale have and have not been plowed. I think the city and state did a pretty good job of getting streets and downtown city sidewalks cleared in a timely manner, especially given this was the worst snowfall the city has seen since 1999. Official reports put the accumulation in Carbondale at 9 inches.

Snow

 Main streets are passible though the town square parking has not been plowed as of noon and plows have not touched side streets. Looks like we got 6 to 10 inches of snow, depending on the area and how much drifting there is. Not many people driving around last night or today.

Snow

 Well, for all the trepidation about yesterday's snowstorm, aside from a number of shutdowns it caused very little interruption in daily operations, at least as far as I can tell. Traffic was moving along normally this morning and even the side streets were passible. No power went out as far as I can tell and the sun actually melted areas where most of the snow had been scraped off.  SIUC reopens at 6 a.m. tomorrow. I guess Cape Girardeau got hit a bit harder as the SEMO campus does not reopen until 10:30 a.m.

Snow

 Looking at the RADAR , it looks bad but not as bad as I had feared. About a quarter of the front has passed Carbondale as of 5:30 p.m. and the snow is very fine. 

Streets

 for whatever reason, streets running east and west in Carbondale tend to get cleared more quickly than do streets running north and south. Most of the east and west bound streets in town were pretty clear and easy to drive down by noon today while most of the North and South streets remained unplowed as of late in the day. Of course the tendency of residents to park their cars on the street, even during snow emergencies, makes it much harder to plow around them. 

Roads 2

 Highways 13 and 51 are in very good shape, so much so that people are driving along them at normal or above normal speeds. Major side streets like Popular, Willow, Tower and Sycamore are in pretty good shape, though I did see evidence that a plow went up Poplar, plowed half a block on Syamore, then turned north onto Bridge. Strange.

Side streets generally have not seen a plow yet so drive carefully on them.

Snow

 Flurries of unseasonable snow hit the area today, though it has al melted off. Pictures I saw from southwest Missouri showed about an inch or so on the ground so we outght to be happy that we got no more than flurries and chilly weather.

Snow and Ice

I guess we want to be very careful with buses on the roads these days but it sure does not seem like it takes very much in the way of snow to warrant a complete shutdown of the school systems throughout southern Illinois.

However drivers didn't do very well yesterday, which may account for the caution. State police reporter over 70 accidents due to the weather in southern Illinois

Highways

Rather bemusing seeing city and state snowplows driving along Highways 13 and 51 scrapping back another inch or so of slush from the edge of the road when so many side streets are still snow covered. I can understand the state trucks needing to focus on state highways but maybe the city vehicles could leave 13 and 51 to the state and work on the side streets, which the state won't touch. Or maybe there is something about the pattern that I don't understand.

Snow Removal

I have to admit, the city and state were right on top of snow removal this time. Thank goodness we didn't get much but I saw trucks out almost immediately.

It does get bemusing though how people handle snow in this area. Any threat of snow and milk, eggs and bread all vanish from the store shelves. One would think we were going to get snowed in for a month, instead of just a couple of days maximum.

Sidewalks

Will be interesting to see if the city actually tickets anyone over uncleared sidewalks. The city contacted businesses after the heavy snow last year but never heard if any tickets got issued. I noticed very few residential sidewalks cleared after last month's snow but saw quite a few people out cleaning them off after this one. Mayor Monty sent out the following this afternoon:

Carbondale’s Acting Mayor Don Monty is urging residents and businesses to promptly remove snow from public sidewalks abutting their properties. Section 17-2-2 of the Carbondale City Code states: “Every owner and every person in charge or control of any building or lot of land within the City fronting or abutting a paved sidewalk . . . shall remove and clear away or cause to be removed and cleared away snow, ice, sleet or freezing rain from a path of at least thirty inches in width along the entire length of the sidewalk which fronts or abuts their property and the roadway.”  The snow, sleet, ice or freezing rain must be removed within 48 hours after the precipitation ends.

Acting Mayor Monty is particularly concerned that snow be removed from sidewalks in business districts, along heavily traveled streets (such as those on the City’s snow routes), along streets leading to schools or the University, and in areas with high densities of residents. He noted that he had driven through parts of Carbondale today and was pleased to see that some businesses and residents had promptly removed the snow from sidewalks. However, it is clear that many have made no effort to remove the snow, and in some cases persons clearing parking lots and driveways have deposited piles of snow on public sidewalks. It is also a violation of the City Code for persons to deposit snow on public sidewalks or around fire hydrants. After the previous heavy snowfall two weeks ago, many of the sidewalks were never cleared.

The reason for removing the snow from sidewalks is for public safety. When the sidewalks are not cleared of snow, sleet, ice and freezing rain, pedestrians are often forced into the streets. This is not safe. People can slip and fall causing serious injuries on snowy or icy sidewalks.  Persons with disabilities are particularly affected when sidewalks are not kept accessible. Children walking to school may try to walk in the street rather than trudge through snow. People without cars who need to get to stores may have to abandon their shopping due to safety concerns. Carbondale has many university students who do not have cars and rely on walking to get to the University or elsewhere in the community. As a community we all are trying to assist SIU in attracting and maintaining students, but Acting Mayor Monty has received messages from students expressing dismay over the failure of businesses and residents to clear snow from sidewalks.

The deadline for removing snow from public sidewalks from the most recent snowfall is Friday evening, March 5. Anyone who has failed to do so is subject to a fine. Also, anyone who has deposited snow on public sidewalks is subject to a fine. Acting Mayor Monty said that he has become very upset by the failure of many people, especially in the areas listed above, to remove the snow from public sidewalks. He and City Council members have asked the City administration to actively enforce the snow removal ordinance. Enforcement is a last resort measure, but many efforts to educate businesses and residents have not resulted in voluntary compliance; therefore, the time for enforcement has arrived.

Enforcement of the snow removal requirements is done by the Building and Neighborhood Services Division which can be reached by calling 457-3237. Persons who desire to complain about snow not being removed from sidewalks should call that number or may contact the City Manager’s office at 457-3226.

Acting Mayor Monty can be reached at 457-3229.

WSIU School Closings Info

WSIU is the only news oriented FM radio station in the area. School closings are news. So why in the world did WSIU not go over the list of them during Morning Edition this past Monday and Wednesday, instead  directing people to the WSIU website for the list of closings? They were able to read the list of closings Tuesday morning along with referring people to the website, which I was quite happy to hear.

What I truly found annoying was that WSIU found time to recap the story about some idiots shooting a snowplow on Monday, with no new information included except for the names. This time could have been used to go over school closings, much more useful to the local community. WSIU  has expanded its local news coverage, though I have some questions about the direction it has chosen to go, but not going over school closings, which is news about as local and useful as you can get and sending people to the website instead, appears to defeat the purpose of local radio.

Snow Emergency

Today, I guess would get classified as a snow emergency, given that we received 4 to 6 inches of the white fluffy stuff. Yet, there were still cars parked along streets designated as "snow emergency" routes. Many fewer than last year, thank goodness but still, they had plenty of advance warning that we were going to get hit by a heavy winter storm and had time to move them to a different location. Much like last year, I wonder if they will get ticketed. If they did not, then there is no reason to expect them to obey the law during the next snow emergency.

Sidewalks

It has been a week since Mother Nature kindly dumped a foot of snow upon Carbondale.  City ordinances say that home owners, rental tenants and business owners have 48 hours to clear their sidewalks or face a fine.  Given the number of still uncleared sidewalks in downtown and the near Northwest side, including some in front of a couple of law offices, the city should be able to put a significant dent in its pension shortfall by ticketing those places with uncleared walkways.

Street Clearing

The city has done a fine job so far of cleaning the main streets.  Walnut and Main are both clear so far as I can see and most of the major side streets such as Oakland, Poplar, Oak and Mill are readily passable, but there are some of the lesser traveled side streets that still need work, which makes me wonder why one of the blow trucks just headed down the right side of Main again.  It plowed the very edge of the street, which didn't appreciably remove more snow that was impeding traffic.  All it seemed to do was throw up a foot high pile of snow blocking what had been ready access to parking lots on that side of the street.