New snow shovelling policy

[pjmorgan.livejournal.com]

I'm going to pick a fight in a passive aggressive way, if that is possible.

So Somerville fines if you shovel snow into the street??!!!
http://www.wickedlocal.com/somerville/news/x1689216222/Fines-set-for-Somervilles-non-shovelers

This is bogus on so many ways.

First of all, during the last storm, right after I shoveled my sidewalk and "shoveled" snow onto my sidewalk. Not just into my driveway (which I've come to expect). Can I fine the city for that?

So is this defined as into the middle of the street, or along the edges? Sometimes you have to shovel just a little bit into the first couple feet of the street. If someone shovels out their car, will that trigger it?

In general, I find it annoying that my real estate taxes go to clearing the roads (which I don't even use since I'm doing my part by not driving) so I guess I have a chip on my shoulder.

And hopefully I just don't understand the regulation. What is the definition of shoveling into the street that they are going off of?

Comments

[rozasharn.livejournal.com]

The spirit of the regulation is that you should not block the traffic lanes with sidewalk snow: that wastes the plows' work.

Plowing usually creates a ridge of snow spanning the edge of the sidewalk and the edge of the street. If you put your sidewalk-snow onto that ridge, you don't create any more traffic hazard than already existed. I've never gotten ticketed for doing it that way.

[jimmyfergus.livejournal.com]

Exactly. There are always places other than the street to throw your snow.

Think of the cyclists, or the near-miss between car and pedestrian which will turn into an actual accident by someone throwing their snow down on the road reducing the car's crip.

I'm frankly very surprised that anyone questions this law. It seems like common sense to me, and very obnoxious to break it.

[pierceheart.livejournal.com]

There are always places other than the street to throw your snow.

Not with some of the buildings that abut the sidewalk directly, ie, have no yards or free frontage.

[jimmyfergus.livejournal.com]

It seems pretty much universal that some of the snow will be put to the side of the sidewalk. Yes, it limits the width, but it has to go somewhere, and that's better than throwing it in the street and hoping it will magically disappear.

[pierceheart.livejournal.com]

I think what I and the OP are trying to say is that the city's law seems to think it's magically going to disappear from the sidewalks and go onto every homes property - which it simply can't do in all cases, and the city doesn't seem to get this.

[ron_newman]

what is a 'crip' ?

[jimmyfergus.livejournal.com]

Typo.... "grip".

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

It only makes sense sometimes, other times it's a denial of basic physics. In Feb and Mar. we'll have plenty of days when it snows over night, the plows clear the streets, and in the morning the sun is shining. If the ratio of street surface-are to sidewalk surface area is approx. 4:1 or 6:1 as it is even on my small side-street, (and accounting for two sidewalks), and if the road-surface is black, then if all my neighbors and I all tossed our snow into the street, then on days that the air-temp hovers around 32-38 at mid-day (like, say, today), then the snow will melt off the road by evening, just from the sun's heat and cars' tires heat. Pedestrians will have better access and cars and winter cyclists (of which I am one) can easily bike through the dusting of snow on the street.

On a heavy-snow day, when it's colder during the day, it makes no sense to do this, of course. The problem is that law covers every snow-situation, but only makes any sense in some.

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

The actual regulation, as opposed to the simplified version above, says you can place snow and ice on the road during daylight hours, when the mean temperature is at least 40 degrees, provided it is broken up and no more than three inches thick. I'm pretty sure the exception listed is for precisely the reasons you state - it'll melt.