OKC doing anything to the streets for this huge ice storm?

[venture]

Then why on earth would you say “YOU CAN'T USE THEM”

Eh...I miss spoke and should have clarified myself better. It happens. We give you a pass almost every day here so you can give me one.

[TheTravellers]

Yep, agree with the sun doing a ton of the city's work. The OKC website (or their twitter feed) said they have 1150 lane miles of emergency snow routes. Assuming 10 plows (don't really know how many they have, that seems conservative) going 20 MPH, and allowing for traffic lights, traffic, breaks for the drivers, etc., they should have the snow routes completely clear within 10 hours (and that's being generous). Why does that not ever happen? During the last snowstorm, they certainly did not plow until they were 100% clear - May Ave was still in bad shape with snow in the medians and turn lanes for a few days afterward, 164th was the same way, a few other streets I was on were the same way. I don't believe it's overkill to plow a snow route until it's clear - hundreds of other cities do this every time they plow and that's the whole point of a snow route (a clear street that people can count on to not be impassable).

[Plutonic Panda]

I thought they had 3? Plows really aren't a thing here because we very rarely get large snowfalls here. Mostly, we get ice. So you'll see a lot more sand and brine trucks than plows.

Every other city has residents that think the roads don't get cleared fast enough. I'm not saying you're wrong, just offering up some perspective. I've worked on projects that touch the location data on these plows. You can just watch them. They are always moving and always doing their thing. So either your math is off or we're totally not following suit. I think the former is most likely true simply because OKC doesn't have an incentive for just doing nothing when these guys are out there. We've got to provide a better reason that they just choose not to do it. Right?

This last storm that came through, the main avenues were is very good shape. Even bridges like Walnut bridge stayed open and clear while the sidewalks on either side had an inch of snow. In my neck of the woods, they did nothing short of an awesome job.

Excellent post and very fair perspective. Does OKC do anything to clear the sidewalks in Downtown?

[ljbab728]

Excellent post and very fair perspective. Does OKC do anything to clear the sidewalks in Downtown?

I'm never downtown during that kind of weather. Is it a problem and do other cities do sidewalk clearance?

[Plutonic Panda]

I'm never downtown during that kind of weather. Is it a problem and do other cities do sidewalk clearance?

Venture mentioned something about cities requiring citizens to clear their sidewalks after a certain period of time, but as far as cities actually doing something to clear the sidewalks, I have no clue.

[venture]

Most cities back north of the essentially a gator or "golf cart" with a plow or blower on the front to clear out any CBD sidewalks. All residential sidewalks are the responsibility of the residents and are required to have them cleared either with in 24 hours or by noon the next day. I've seen some even tighter to a few hours after the snow ends.

[LocoAko]

As far as street people always doing a great job? I'll bite my tongue so I don't offend anyone here. I'll just put it this way - Schools/businesses etc shouldn't be closed for 3-5 days after the snow ends.

Don't want to offend anyone, but I'm with you on this one...

[bluedogok]

Excellent post and very fair perspective. Does OKC do anything to clear the sidewalks in Downtown?

At our office in LoDo the property owners are responsible for clearing sidewalks, we usually clear our section ourselves and so do the bars around us. The larger properties will usually have a a landscape or property service company clear them. At my wife's building in Capitol Hill their maintenance staff clears the walks, parking lot and alley. There is a CBD crew that picks up trash and such, I think they clean off the 16th Street Mall area walks but I haven't seen them doing any of that in our area by Coors Field.

For residential sidewalk clearing most of the cities have ordinances requiring owners or tenants to clear the sidewalks within 24 hours of the end of the snow. We got a warning from the City of Aurora at the rental house when we were in Austin loading up the moving truck. Luckily it was written the day that we arrived in Aurora with the truck so I had to clear the walk and driveway to unload the truck anyway.

For the most part residential streets do not get cleared up here until the main roads a completely cleared. For a big storm it may be 4-5 days before residential streets have anything done to them. That is about how long it took in Aurora, here in unincorporated Arapahoe County they don't do our residential streets.

[Mel]

I'm never downtown during that kind of weather. Is it a problem and do other cities do sidewalk clearance?

Sometimes up to 70% off.

[TheTravellers]

I thought they had 3? Plows really aren't a thing here because we very rarely get large snowfalls here. Mostly, we get ice. So you'll see a lot more sand and brine trucks than plows.

Every other city has residents that think the roads don't get cleared fast enough. I'm not saying you're wrong, just offering up some perspective. I've worked on projects that touch the location data on these plows. You can just watch them. They are always moving and always doing their thing. So either your math is off or we're totally not following suit. I think the former is most likely true simply because OKC doesn't have an incentive for just doing nothing when these guys are out there. We've got to provide a better reason that they just choose not to do it. Right?

This last storm that came through, the main avenues were is very good shape. Even bridges like Walnut bridge stayed open and clear while the sidewalks on either side had an inch of snow. In my neck of the woods, they did nothing short of an awesome job.

Finally was able to get info from the city today - they have 30 plows and 4 graders. Which makes it even more baffling that the emergency snow routes aren't cleared in a timely manner (or at all, sometimes).

[MWCGuy]

Weather forecasting has progressed by leaps and bounds over the last few years. Employers should keep their non essential employees home on days when severe weather of any type has a 50% or more chance of occurring. Businesses should not wait until the storm arrives to shut down. If the weather does not happen employees can always report for a half day. Businesses that need employees to be present (hospitals, utilities, government , etc.) should set their people up to sleep over at the office or in a nearby hotel/motel. We have every kind of extreme weather happen in this state. We need to start planning for it. The days of flying by the seat of our pants needs to come to an end.

[LakeEffect]

Finally was able to get info from the city today - they have 30 plows and 4 graders. Which makes it even more baffling that the emergency snow routes aren't cleared in a timely manner (or at all, sometimes).

I'm curious. Are you originally from OKC, or did you live elsewhere?

[TheTravellers]

I'm curious. Are you originally from OKC, or did you live elsewhere?

Originally from OKC. Check my posting history, I believe the semi-full story's in there somewhere.

[LakeEffect]

Originally from OKC. Check my posting history, I believe the semi-full story's in there somewhere.

Would you be in favor of paying higher taxes in order to have more plows and road maintenance in general?

[ou48A]

Would you be in favor of paying higher taxes in order to have more plows and road maintenance in general?

How much economic activity and paid taxes is lost by people not being able to go to work. How much sales tax money is lost when folks don't go out and shop.....I would bet that its a surprisingly high amout of money when you consider that it's not untypical to have several days of slick roads each year.

It's highly likely IMO that cleaning off the roads sooner would likely increase our economic activity by enough over the life of the equipment to pay for the associated cost.
Most of the ice and snow equipment will last for decades.
IMHO our taxes would not need to be raised.

Removing the ice and snow quicker would also reduce the damage done to our pavements.

[TheTravellers]

Would you be in favor of paying higher taxes in order to have more plows and road maintenance in general?

I'm not sure, have to figure out my total tax rate now (renter, so don't pay property tax), based on gas tax, sales tax, income tax, and where they get the street maintenance funds from. Possibly yes, if it would help. Kind of like the OTA and whatever the IL tollway authority is called - we pay a toll, they get the roads cleared better than any of the other agencies (based on completely anecdotal experience from both me and my wife over the years).

Another good question is - why can't OKC clear 39 lane miles per plow in a day or two with the current funding?

[Spartan]

30 isn't much. During major snowstorms there are 500 on the roads plowing and salting just around Cleveland, not counting every private Joe with a truck. Just saying, I'd believe OKC has 30. Atlanta has 50 and they are so amazingly inept.

[TheTravellers]

30 plows or 3? I'm afraid there has been a mistake. I have a hard time believing the City of Oklahoma City has 30 plows. They may have blades they can install onto trucks but that a snow plow does not that truck make.

Direct from ward8 and the appropriate department (and yeah, I'd agree that 30 isn't much for the size of OKC, but we don't get nearly as much snow as Cleveland and we should still be able to clear 39 lane miles of road just for the emergency snow routes per plow pretty quickly):

Mr. XXX:

Information you requested is shown below. Thank you for contacting Councilman.

We have 30 plows and four road graders in Public Works.

[bluedogok]

The city limits of Denver is "small" compared to OKC, we have a lot of larger suburbs around Denver. One report recently stated there were over 100 trucks that the City of Denver could be fitted with plows and chemical/sand dispensers. Not sure how many Aurora and the other burbs have but I do see the ones in Aurora running all the time in bad weather and the roads there are usually in pretty good shape. We are in unincorporated Arapahoe County and they have some of their own, the main street through our neighborhood gets cleared but the side streets do not. The toll road (E-470) has their own equipment and it stays pretty cleared most of the time, it was clear when I was on it a few times yesterday.

[Mel]

Their count probably Takes into account contracted salter/plows.

[LakeEffect]

Sorry. I should have been clear. I wasn't doubting that's what you were told. Anyway, I think it is either just a case of semantics or they've got more plows than I thought.

Denver has 60 I believe.

For a city of our size and location, that's a very healthy fleet.

I've said before, the solution is just to use a makeshift AVL. Then everyone can see where the plows are at all times. City of Chicago :: Plow Tracker

That answers the question about what they are doing for anyone that cares to look.

The City has AVL, but keeps that info to themselves.

The City has 0 "dedicated" plows, but has 30 trucks that transform into plows. Most northern cities do the same - they buy trucks that double as normal dirt/debris-hauling trucks outside of winter.

One thing I wish the City would explore is using plows on the underside of trucks (belly plows). I think they provide more downforce and are more capable of scraping off the snow/ice accumulation than our standard front plows.

[LakeEffect]

Their count probably Takes into account contracted salter/plows.

It doesn't. The City's contracted plow guys generally use motor graders and front end loaders.

[venture]

I haven't got out today yet, but how are the crews doing today?

[venture]

35 from Norman to okc didn't get bad until okc. 240 had one lane and was pretty annoying. Highway 9 in Norman wasn't touched or very poorly done. Airport road was perfect. Now if we can just get some consistency. Lol

[TheTravellers]

The City has AVL, but keeps that info to themselves.

The City has 0 "dedicated" plows, but has 30 trucks that transform into plows. Most northern cities do the same - they buy trucks that double as normal dirt/debris-hauling trucks outside of winter.

One thing I wish the City would explore is using plows on the underside of trucks (belly plows). I think they provide more downforce and are more capable of scraping off the snow/ice accumulation than our standard front plows.

I agree - I seriously doubt OKC would give out the AVL info, there's no way they'd want the general public to know where the plows are (transparency isn't OKC's strong suit).

And I also seriously doubt the number I got from the city included contractors, they specifically said "... in Public Works", which would indicate that the count was the number owned by the city. And I agree, I do think their snow plows are dump trucks fitted with salt/sand sprinklers and front plows during the winter, I don't think they're full-time dedicated.

Wonder how horrible the streets are going to be tomorrow and Wednesday?