Steve Smith walked the sodden fairway at Fresh Meadow Golf Club in Hillside on Tuesday with a buddy. Almost one year to the day earlier, he trudged down the middle of a snowbound Lincoln Avenue on Chicago’s North Side in search of food.
That was during the infamous “snowpocalypse,” when more than 21 inches of snow fell in a historic blizzard that struck between Jan. 31 and Feb. 2, claiming at least a dozen lives, leaving hundreds of cars stranded on Lake Shore Drive and paralyzing the region for days.
Emergency services administrators learned harsh lessons from the third-worst snowstorm in Chicago history, an Arctic blast that registered winds of 70 miles per hour and left almost 50,000 without electricity.
Among other measures, the city has installed removable barriers on Lake Shore Drive to reroute traffic and placed more cameras there to monitor weather conditions. An updated paging system and the distribution of 700 mobile phones to plow drivers has shaved 10 minutes off the time it takes snow removal crews to hit the streets, officials say.
In the suburbs, Wheaton plans to use private contractors to clear secondary streets and cul-de-sacs. Schaumburg is exploring the enlistment of citizen snowmobilers to help in emergencies. And Naperville will use compact loaders in hard-to-reach parts of subdivisions.
But apart from rerouting CTA buses from Lake Shore Drive during a Jan. 20 storm, officials have had few chances to try out new emergency plans this winter, one of the mildest in memory. On the last day of January — the official anniversary for the start of the great blizzard of 2011 — temperatures hit 57 degrees.
Forecasts for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday projected a continued mix of sunshine and clouds with temperatures remaining well above the normal high of 32 degrees, although freezing rain may arrive Friday night.
Golfers, golf course managers and public works directors from Highland Park to Tinley Park were relishing this latest weird weather outbreak.
“I wish every winter were this strange,” Elgin Public Works Superintendent Dan Rich said. The city used nearly 8,000 tons of road salt last winter, he added. This year, Rich expects that total to be 3,000 tons.
Like many public workers who plowed snow in early February 2011, Elgin crews have been dispatched for other chores this year, Rich said, including street sweeping. Crews were sweeping streets in Joliet and Crystal Lake, trimming trees in Tinley Park and Wheaton, installing street signs and repairing roads in Glen Ellyn, and landscaping in Glencoe.
Every municipality contacted by the Tribune reported cost savings so far this winter compared with the last one. Chicago, for example, has used less salt since the winter started than it did during last year’s blizzard, the Department of Streets and Sanitation reported.
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Overall, the city spent about $6 million on snow removal last winter compared with about $550,000 as of late December 2011, according to a department spokesman.
Despite the relatively tame weather, Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Thomas Byrne — and others — warned that the season isn’t over yet.
“We’re thankful … but our cost savings will be at the end of the year when we reassess what our salt piles are and what our equipment costs are,” Byrne said. “These (snowstorms) aren’t cheap. Your budget can diminish quickly.”
Schaumburg budgeted $600,000 for overtime for the 2011-12 winter season and has spent about $100,000, an official said. If that trend continues, the village will save about $400,000 from the budgeted overtime amount and accumulate another $250,000 in road salt savings, he said.
Joliet has saved about $450,000 in its snow removal budget, said Mike Eulitz, the city’s street division director, and used less than half of its salt supply compared with last year.
“I’ll take another 30-40 days of this,” he said.
The amount of road salt Naperville has used — as well as the bill — was cut nearly in half, dropping from 11,600 tons used by this point last winter to 5,800 tons spread so far, at a cost of $370,000, said Christine Schwartzhoff of the city’s public works department.
And though that may be good for the city’s bottom line, some plow operators are itching for overtime pay, she said.
“They certainly are wishing for some more snow,” she said. “The amount of overtime they’ve worked is a fraction” of last year.
Nearly two-thirds of the way through the regular snowfall season, Tinley Park Public Works Director Dale Schepers said the village has deployed its snow removal team only eight times. Last year, crews had been called out 16 times by the end of January.
“This is kind of like a Texas winter,” said Schepers, who lived in College Station, Texas, for six years before coming to Tinley Park in 2004. “It’s 60 degrees. You get a little snow, and a couple days later, it’s all melted.”
Steve DePaepe, owner of Chicago Lawn Mower & Snowblower, said he misses one result of last year’s blizzard: higher revenue. After robust sales last year, he ordered additional snowblowers, but more than 100 remain in stock.
“You can’t get nervous,” he said. “When it snows, you sell ’em,” and when it doesn’t, you won’t.
Lindsey Kundel’s experience was as memorable but for a dramatically different reason. Kundel was trapped in her car for hours on Lake Shore Drive. Afterward, it took three days for her to retrieve the vehicle.
“It was scary when I was in it,” Kundel said Tuesday, “but I think the only way you can deal with it afterward is to joke about it.”
Moving also helps. Kundel, 22, now is a high school English teacher in Charlotte, N.C., where she hasn’t worn a winter coat this season, she said.
“I think I’ll move back to Chicago,” said Kundel, a Northwestern University grad with close friends in the city. “But I need a couple of years without it.”
At Fresh Meadow, General Manager Mike Huber said the mild weather has yielded “found money” for the golf course. By noon Tuesday, 99 golfers had shown up, said Huber, who expected 800 rounds of golf to be played in January.
That compares with a paltry 20 rounds last January.
“This has been a big day,” he added.
Smith, who was sharing a golf cart with a friend, said he actually enjoyed the snowstorm of February but preferred Tuesday’s April-like weather.
“I like the snow,” said Smith, 32, of Chicago, after teeing off on the first hole. “Don’t get me wrong, but I can go to northern Wisconsin for some snow. This is our second round of golf in 2012.”
Tribune reporters Jim Jaworski, Mary Owen, Kate Thayer, Ashley Rueff, Brian Slodysko and John Huston contributed.
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