The cost to Naperville for city crews and contractors to combat Blizzard of 2015 is being estimated at more than a half-million dollars.
Crews continued hauling snow out of the way this week after last weekend’s blizzard brought Naperville and the rest of the region one of the largest February snowfalls on record.
Many of the piles shoveled out by heavy machinery from city-managed property are being hauled to an open lot on Jefferson Avenue west of Ogden Avenue. Most of that task is done overnight, city spokeswoman Linda LaCloche said.
“They started the carting of the snow out of downtown and the train stations Monday night,” LaCloche said. “”They’ve kind of been going nonstop, almost, since Saturday.”
That has meant calling in extra plows, and having staff log some overtime. Erik Hallgren, assistant to Public Works Director Dick Dublinski, calculated that between Saturday and Wednesday evenings, employees’ snowstorm work added $220,000 to the payroll, and plowing contractors brought in to help the crews keep up cost about that same amount. The salt and calcium chloride put down to minimize road ice ran about $95,000, Hallgren reported, estimating the total storm expenses at $535,000.
When the flakes started to fly once again Wednesday morning, the salt trucks were back out in force, though the relatively negligible inch or two didn’t call for another major mobilization of the plows.
“We still need to hit the roads, salting the arterials and the priority-one streets,” LaCloche said.
The city also needs to finish getting the snow out of the way. By the time the public walkways and parking lots are all cleaned up, trucks will have plowed and hauled away about 1.3 million cubic feet of it, about 4,000 at a time. The task was about 90 percent complete by mid-day Thursday.
“You can say around 300 semi truckloads have been (moved) since there is still snow to move,” Hallgren said by email.
The process for keeping privately owned walkways passable is subject to less direct control by the city. The townships’ highway departments and the county don’t regulate the clearing of sidewalks, but the matter is addressed directly in the city code.
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In Title 9, the code stipulates that whenever 2 inches or more of snow has fallen, or there is an accumulation of ice, the property owner has 48 hours to clear off “any public sidewalk or sidewalks abutting on or adjacent sidewalk or sidewalks to such lot or parcel of land.”
The city sent residents a reminder Wednesday, using its Naper Notify communications network, to make sure their sidewalks are clear and that their mailboxes and any fire hydrants on their property can be accessed.
The city’s Transportation, Engineering and Development department had issued two citations for code violations as of mid-day Thursday, both to businesses. LaCloche said both had remedied the problem.
“Obviously when you have this kind of snow it’s definitely difficult,” she said. “But we want our residents to have safe passages, whether it’s in neighborhoods or business areas.”
The city’s salt supplies appear secure, barring many more extraordinary snow events. About 40 percent of the season’s inventory has been used so far, Hallgren said, some 8,260 tons of salt. Although more than 12,000 tons are still on hand, the city can order nearly 5,300 more under its state purchasing contract if stocks begin to run low, as happened last year.
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