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

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

I wonder how the Romans dealt with snow.

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

By not getting a whole lot of it in Rome, I imagine. But to be less snarky and look at more outlying parts of empire -- well, hm, "Etsi mons Cevenna, qui Arvernos ab Helviis discludit, durissimo tempore anni altissima nive iter impediebat, tamen discussa nive sex in altitudinem pedum atque ita viis patefactis summo militum sudore ad fines Arvernorum pervenit." from Gallic Wars 7.8 (in essense, "when Caesar's men hit 6 feet of snow they shoveled with maximum badassery," but they are unspecific about technology). But that's the midst of a military campaign where you would expect that sort of thing; I don't know off the top of my head where I would look for a cite on how they handled the everyday business of keeping their road network functional in winter...A cursory search of Perseus for some forms of nix,nivis does not suggest an obvious passage to mine.