For four straight days and night, the plows haven’t stopped in Snoqualmie.
Nine drivers on Snoqualmie’s three shifts have worked steadily, keeping their spirits up with regular coffee and lunch breaks. Yet, by Wednesday, Jan. 18, faced with a fourth overnight shift, a dwindling sand pile, worn plow blades and one truck down for maintenance, Mike Roy, operations manager for Snoqualmie’s public works division, figured his street team was good and ready for clear skies.
“Since Sunday at 1 a.m., it’s been nonstop, all-day,” he said.
Keeping roads safe is a battle against time, with drivers spread thin and plows continually scraping and peeling, bringing the blacktop back to light.
Patrolling the Ridge on Wednesday afternoon, Roy’s cell phone kept ringing as he tracked down plows. He had put out a call for extra equipment to break through an icy crust on Fairway Avenue, and finally found an extra front-end loader.
“It’s not ‘one pass and you’re done,'” Roy said. With 42 miles of roadway to clear with three drivers in three trucks, the job is straightforward but never easy.
“We’re always challenged to let citizens know that,” Roy said.
Priority routes
Roy’s nine drivers go in shifts, morning, day and night, with the most experienced drivers on the night shift. While most Valley streets were quiet Wednesday, and most commuters opting to stay off the road, plow drivers in Snoqualmie, North Bend and unincorporated King County remained at the wheel.
“We’re trying to make it safer for everyone to travel,” Roy said.
They can’t hit every road at once. This week, Roy’s team fielded six phone calls from concerned residents wondering if and when the plows were coming.
“We say, ‘Please look at the map,'” he said.
Like North Bend and King County, Snoqualmie works by a snowplow priority map and a snow and ice removal plan.
In Snoqualmie, “we focus on the parkway, and the main collectors: Meadowbrook, Fairway, Ridge Street,” Roy said. Secondary streets come next, then residential streets, then alleys.
Typically, public works crew knows when snow is coming, and they work with police to decide when to bring in drivers and roll the plows. Most of Roy’s team rely on four-wheel-drive vehicles to make it to work. Their other car is a snowplow.
Plow drivers
Don Harris, Snoqualmie’s Fleet and Facilities Supervisor, splits his time between driving a plow and working in the shop, keeping trucks on the road.
He and part-time driver Todd Shinn recounted where conditions were the worst Wednesday—on the hillsides.
“We’re lucky it didn’t hit the downtown area as much,” Harris said. “When it’s widespread like this, we’ve got three plows spread in every direction.”
Plow-driving can be nerve-wracking for Shinn.
“The roads are pretty narrow,” he said. “There are cars everywhere, kids everywhere. You’re constantly checking where you’re going.”
The big GMC plow trucks are plenty heavy, but they still must obey the laws of physics. Shinn said he needs stopping distance, and recalls at least one hillside slide.
“A lot of the time it’s whited out,” Harris said. “You don’t see any fog lines.” When he drives, “you’re constantly keying in your sides,” ensuring the truck is on the road and not endangering the cars and people along the edge.
Roy said his team rarely gets the credit they deserve for keeping the city’s streets and pipes functional in all weather. But snow puts them in the public eye.
“This is when these guys shine,” Roy said. “Public works is the silent soldier. These guys work their butts off. They don’t get to see their families. They don’t get much chance to enjoy the snow.”
Asked whether he’d like a snow day, Harris laughs.
“It’s part of our job,” he said. “They don’t work me 24 hours a day. When I do go home, I’m tired. But I still get family time.”
Besides, the snow is fleeting.
“How often do we have these snow events?” Harris asked.
“Too much of a good thing is bad,” Roy said. “You like to see the snow, but three or four days of it will make anybody crazy.”
His crews plow to make sure everyone else can stay on the snow, and enjoy winter safely.
“There’s still a little kid in all of us,” he said. “That’s why you put the time in.”
How much more snow?
Besides the six phone calls, Roy also got one much-appreciated attaboy e-mail from a resident. He believes Snoqualmie deserves it. That’s because, unlike bigger cities, Snoqualmie has the means to plow residential streets along with the big collectors.
“We’re small enough that we can do a really good job,” Roy said. “It may not look like it right now, but as soon as this starts to turn, this will thaw to bare pavement a lot quicker than other agencies who let it pile up.”
In this first major snowstorm of the year, Roy is concerned about the longevity of the snow. Snowfall is expected to continue through Thursday, and more storms are predicted on the weekend.
“Right now, we’re kind of in the middle of it,” Roy said. Snow turned to slush Tuesday, but cooling temperatures left an icy crust on roads Wednesday; the slick road conditions canceled Valley schools.
“This is challenging, because it’s frozen,” Roy said. “When it gets below freezing, it’s stuck. (Plow drivers) are constantly trying to get it worked down, so it goes away quick.”
Besides people, the storm is hard on resources. The city starts going through salt, sand and plow blades. On Wednesday, one of the city’s three plows was down for maintenance.
“We budget for it, we budget for the overtime,” Roy said. The costs are there even after the snow is gone. Following the melt, the city has to sweep up all the sand. Frozen-over storm drains make for other messes.
“We’re going to have some localized urban flooding,” Roy said. “This stuff will plug the drains.”
What’s on the roads?
To combat ice and provide traction, the city uses bulk sand from the local CalPortland quarry, and a granular product called Ice Slicer, a magnesium chloride salt. Magnesium chloride is much less corrosive than rock salt. According to Roy, by the time it reaches the edge of the road, it’s so diluted that it’s environmentally harmless.
The city is in the process of purchasing liquid de-icer, similar to what the Washington state Department of Transportation uses on overpasses.
The Martin Luther King, Jr., Day storm had the city quickly using up its sand pile, which was restocked Wednesday morning.
Afterwards, the job turns to sweeping the grit from the streets. In the 2006 snowstorm, “We spent two or three weeks sweeping up,” Roy said. The city is trying to reduce reliance on sand, but the gritty stuff has its uses.
“In places here, you’ve just got a sheet of ice,” Roy said. “The sand has its place.”
Learn more about priority plowing
King County and the cities of Snoqualmie and North Bend plow streets based on a priority list, with major collectors plowed first, secondary streets afterward.
North Bend, for example, prioritizes North Bend Way, Bendigo and Mountain View Boulevards, while King County plows the Preston-Fall City Road first.
North Bend’s priority routes can be viewed at http://ci.north-bend.wa.us/vertical/Sites/%7B55597B5E-85E1-47C5-878F-C852028CFBC5%7D/uploads/SnowPlow_map2009_REV1.pdf
You can learn about King County’s unincorporated area snowplow routes at http://www.kingcounty.gov/transportation/kcdot/Roads/RoadsMaintenance/SnowAndIcePlan.aspx. The county priority map can be viewed at http://your.kingcounty.gov/kcdot/roads/wcms/maintenance/snowicemap.pdf.
Snoqualmie’s snowplow map and snow removal plan can be viewed at http://www.ci.snoqualmie.wa.us/Departments/EmergencyManagement/FloodStormInformation/tabid/429/Default.aspx
Residents can help by moving their cars off of the street and into your driveway. The clearer the street, the quicker and better it can be plowed.
