“Lean resource levels” may lead to snow-clearing challenges in Saint John this winter, according to city staff.
Staff presented an update on the city’s winter management plan to Common Council on Monday night.
“Resources are lean to maximize cost efficiency,” city staff said in a report written ahead of the meeting.
Tim O’Reilly, director of public works and transportation, said only one resource is available for each of the 44 street and sidewalk plow routes under “ideal circumstances.”
“When resources are unavailable for any reason or even depending upon the time of the winter storm or the conditions associated, the community can expect us not to fully meet our service objectives,” said O’Reilly.
A staff report cited two specific changes that will impact resource availability this year. The first is nighttime recycling collection, which will require reallocation of resources.
The second is the continuing challenge of supply chain disruption, which could impact the amount of time equipment is down when mechanical breakdowns occur.
“For this coming winter, we expect some challenges being able to meet service objectives in the late evenings and the early morning hours. The impacts of this would depend on when the storms actually occur,” said O’Reilly.
Current service objectives
Each street and sidewalk fits into one of four priorities with a detailed set of service objectives.
- Priority 1: Emergency routes, main streets and highway connections.
- Priority 2: Major bus routes, school zones, community centres and business districts.
- Priority 3: Residential collector streets, minor bus routes and industrial parks.
- Priority 4: Local or subdivision streets.
During a winter storm, crews aim to achieve a “basic level of accessibility” on priority 1 and 2 streets and sidewalks.
Once the storm is done, the goal is to have priority 1 and 2 streets “passable” within eight hours, and priority 3 and 4 streets within 12 hours.
From there, crews aim to have travel lanes pushed back and anti-icing material applied within 48 hours after a storm on priority 1 and 2 streets, within 72 hours on priority 3 streets, and within 96 hours on priority 4 streets.
When it comes to the city’s 225 kilometres of sidewalks, the goal is to remove snow within 12 hours for priority 1, within 24 hours for priority 2 and 3, and within 72 hours for Priority 4.
The aim is to have salt or sand applied within two days for priority 1 sidewalks, within three days for priority 2 and 3, and within four days for priority 4.
A new priority level
For the upcoming season, council has approved a priority 6 level, which will encompass a 5.5-kilometre unpaved section of Old Black River Road which has three seasonal dwellings.
The section of road, according to city staff, has often not been cleared to meet timelines of any of the four priorities due to its lack of drainage and proper base and subbase materials.
Under the new standard, travel lanes will be passable within eight days after a storm, but the road could be impassable indefinitely when “particular climatic conditions that create rutted and/or ice packed conditions occur.”
“The proposed change in service level more accurately reflects what is achievable with current resource levels,” said the staff report.
O’Reilly said there are also plans to introduce a priority 5 level at some point, though discussions are still ongoing.
Looking back at the 2021-22 winter season
The previous winter was a “challenging” season, said O’Reilly, with more severe winter storms in a one-month period than all of the previous winter.
Saint John saw seven recordable storms last winter, including five within a one-month period. The previous winter, the city only had four recordable storms.
The city met its service level objectives an average of 91 per cent of the time for priority 1 streets and 88 per cent of the time for priority 3 and 4 streets.
But O’Reilly said those numbers dropped considerably during the back-to-back storms in January and February.
“Only slightly more than half of our streets were made passable for the timelines of our service objectives,” he said. In terms of sidewalks, only 20 per cent met service objectives in some cases.
Changes to overnight parking bans this year
O’Reilly said staff have identified a number of service efficiencies and planning efforts to better assure objectives can be met this year.
One of the big changes will be in the timing of overnight winter parking bans which are called after a storm.
Staff will shift away from calling those bans during the night of a storm, according to O’Reilly.
“In the height of a storm, we tried to call north-east-west parking bans. Simply put, we couldn’t get to all of the streets during that ban,” he said.
Any bans in the south-central peninsula will continue to happen the night after a storm. But north-east-west bans, if needed, will now take place the following night.
City staff said there will also be the need for more localized parking bans for which signage needs to be put out at least 24 hours in advance.
You can view the full report to council by clicking here.
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