Snowstorms have been almost relentless in Timmins lately.
The city’s public works manager, Shane Skinner, says it’s been impossible to keep up.
Workers have been on the roads 24 hours a day, plowing and hauling snow to several snow dumps around the city.
“13,793 dump trucks full as of February 26th,” he reports. That’s the latest figure available and as Skinner notes, it’s been greatly escalating since then. He estimates that’s about double the number of last year.
The workers and equipment are challenged to keep roads that are priorities for safety and traffic flow open, and having to return to them sooner than usual.
“We’re still getting to our secondary roads as we speak as well this week,” says Skinner. “Be patient. We’re going to do our best to get there with the equipment we have.”
The next challenge as soon as this weekend will be temperatures well above zero, causing melting, ponding and flooding. Because the ground is still frozen, the water will not be absorbed.
“We will probably be seeing some ponding and noticing the ponding on roads as we open up the catch basins and so on. Obviously when we know that occurs, potholes pop up.”
Skinner cautions you that potholes that can damage your vehicle might be at the bottom of those ponds and puddles.
The Python pothole patching machine is already out doing its thing.
