City of Hamilton staff prepare for winter weather

As we wait for the first major blast of winter, the City of Hamilton is getting ready for just about anything.

While snow can be a problem, the city says the six ice storms that hit the area last year were more difficult to handle.

Speaking at the newly-built road salt building on Wentworth Street North this morning, the manager of roadway maintenance Peter Sniuolis says the city’s 300 vehicles are ready to clear the 6500 kilometres of streets, and the more than 800 kilometres of sidewalks.

“Our winter preparedness starts early, it starts in August. We get the blades on, we get trucks calibrated, we get the materials sorted, we make sure everything’s functioning, running. Once the storm actually hits earlier in the year, we make sure to get staff is trained, make sure everything is prepped,” Sniuolis said.

“We’re still doing prepping, drainage issues, potholes, routine maintenance, we’re still prepping for the winter but the weather has blessed us a bit so we’re able to take care of summer maintenance at this time.”

There is roughly 5000 tonnes of road salt in the dome on Wentworth Street North, which is expected to serve most of the lower city.

READ MORE: City of Hamilton launches winter response strategy

“So far the weather has been kind to us, but the weather is certainly cooling down now so we’re ready for anything that comes any day,” Mark Priest from the City of Hamilton said.

“One thing we have noticed is winter is starting later, it has been delayed. When we do get them they are significant…last year we had six freezing rain events which is far beyond what we typically get which presents a big challenge for us,” Priest said.

And city officials say freezing rain poses a different challenge than heavy snowfall.

When it comes to a freezing rain event, typically we have to pretreat a lot of those roads, we always pretreat the hotspots, but once that ice sets it presents a big challenge, specifically for our smaller equipment,” Sniuolis said.

“So we do have to put down more material earlier and stay consistent throughout that storm,” Sniuolis said.

The city uses forecasting equipment and they’re not expecting any winter storm activity until the new year.