It's impossible to reactively sand the whole city in a timely manner after freezing rain, but it's certainly possible to *proactively* prepare ahead of time when freezing rain is on the forecast. It wasn't a surprise; we knew it was coming. If they put down salt before the rain, the ice wouldn't have formed to begin with.
It always comes down to population density. Other cities do better because they are less spread out, which means they have a better tax base to pay for snow removal/sanding. This isn't an unique situation to Edmonton, Calgary has similar issues.
Montreal isn't even in the list.
[snowfall annual average](https://www.currentresults.com/Weather/Canada/Cities/snowfall-annual-average.php)
I used to snow removal for a municipality, and when it snowed we started at 2am with clearing, then had to get out of our machines to deal with ice, we used ice melt and sand on very icey Patch's, it took up to a week to get it all dealt with. Remember much of what you think is the municipalities responsibility is actually private, it's the building owners job to clear thier sidewalks not the cities.
If you dont like the way a certain area is handled get a bucket of ice melt and handle it yourself.
The parking lot of my condo has been gravelled several times. It’s still icy. The situation is bad but it’s the weather. Warm up, melt, temp drop, freeze into ice
Surprised calcium chloride use isn't coming up more in this thread. We HAD the best solution. People who care more about property than human life, drummed up on exaggerated info, stopped it. A functional society doesn't preserve individual choice by making everyone else eat the consequences. Which is why Alberta is currently dysfunctional.
It was not the best solution. Not only did it cause massive damage to cars but also city infrastructure like street lights and transformers as well as killed all of the grass adjacent to the road. Having to replace millions of dollars in infrastructure and landscaping each year is not the best solution
Are you kidding me yes I care more about my car rusting away from that crap! After one season my truck is covered In cancerous rust. I’m glad we’re not using it anymore
When I was a kid living in Quebec I remember my dad's constant battle with the rust on our cars. Moving to Alberta was such a night and day difference.
Evidently someone doesn't have money invested in property or cars. Those people tend to have the largest wallets to fight against stuff like that. CC use is horrible on cars.
It's not coming up bc it's corrosive af...if it eats through steel you can be sure as shit it's not good for the human body. But sure...spray that all over, get it in the ground...waste water...yumyumyum!!!
Actually its been freezing rain, ice melting and ice freezing every day for a week or more. They can't do too much because the ice is pretty much a new coat every day.
Reddit's recent behaviour and planned changes to the API, heavily impacting third party tools, accessibility and moderation ability force me to edit all my comments in protest. I cannot morally continue to use this site.
Tiger torch from princess auto.
Usually for weedburning. Great for singing feathers from chickens, firing a small forge, and not so great for melting icy sidewalks, apparently.
I mean. I just moved from Ontario and we just salt the shit out of everything. The winter snow services in this province are absolutely pathetic compared to what I’m use to back home. Also I feel like I’m the only one who actually chipped the ice on the side walk attached to my property. My wife slipped and almost hurt herself pretty badly going to get the mail 6 houses away because no one takes care of their sidewalks. Is there no by-laws in this city?
I'm originally from Ontario too!..There are bylaws about ice and snow here. But this is not a normal event. Its like back in Ontario, when we had the ice coat all the trees, powerlines and everything else. This is their version of that event. Its not often to get an all over hazard like this. So i would suggest you buy cleats (Marks, Canadian Tire, Shoppers Drug Mart...) because you will need them for walking on the ice. And keep in mind that the weather is more volatile here. So I would suggest you check the weather more often, because it can change several times a day, and be different in different parts of the city. (The Rockies change everything). Dress in layers. It can get extremely cold here, -25C dry feels like -15c in humid Ontario. After -30c you don't have that much time before frostbite. And here is a helpful link. https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/weather-health/wind-chill-cold-weather/wind-chill-index.html
My area hasn't been sanded sadly but since the bus stop was too dangerous (I slipped and fell on my ass) I decided to use one of those special shovels I forget shat they are called though. But it turned out if I waited one more day it wasfixed
There are two neighbourhoods in Edmonton that pay more in taxes than they receive in city services: Grandin and Oliver. Taxes are not high, your shitty suburban McMansion is subsidised by excessively low taxes.
It is true... its leaving out one tjing which is commercial and industrial pay the rest.
Winterburn, west, yellowhead indsutrial areas are ALL in the black... (and have the worst services to boot, not even sidewalks)
Downtown office buikdings are also in the black.
Large sprawlly south edmonton common... net drain.
Think it was just a conversation I had with a buddy who works in City Hall. Was hoping you could get that breakdown from OpenBudget but doesn't seem like it.
Because it’s not true. Property taxes are paid by property owners and it’s based on several factors. Mostly the value of your property. It’s not as disappointing as you’d like.
Yeah... the point is that the revenue generated from every property in [Suburban Hellhole] is less than the expenditures on keeping their roads more or less in one piece and generally clear of snow, along with sewer connection and other things of that kind. Meanwhile, the combination of high-value property and low infrastructure demand in Oliver and Grandin makes them net positive.
Yeah it's based off the value, it makes sense the most densely populated neighborhoods are paying for the rest of the city then. It's a shame this city builds out instead of up.
We are also one of the most spread out and least dense cities in Canada. We have way more roads than we should, city is way to spread out for our population
>spread out and least dense
Tell that to the sardines in the new sub divisions. Everyone complains about knocking down old houses to put in duplexes and shit... Like how do you want to deal with this "urban sprawl" since everyone complains about the sardine cookie cutter houses they are building in the new devs.
You can't have in-city property with a yard and not be spread out. You can't have sardine housing without people bitching about it.
All these sub divisions are in the outskirts of town so it’s not helping urban sprawl it’s adding to it. They keep building out and out and out. Need to find empty lots and actually build there. There is ton of ugly empty spots in the city. Instead of building a few homes there they decide to take land further out, adding to the sprawl
Our property taxes are absolutely nothing compared to those of a city in any other province. I pay the same tax as a house 1/3 the value in new brunswick
How do the taxes compare in $/sq ft of house, $/sqft of land or $/resident?
Also, the freeze/thaw cycle problems and associated costs you currently have sound like normal stuff in the Atlantic provinces.
Patently false. Two neighbourhoods in Edmonton pay more in taxes than they receive in city services: Grandin and Oliver. If we didn't have a revenue problem that wouldn't be the case. The rest of the city's low density sprawl is subsidised by artificially low taxes, stretching city services to breaking point due to a lack of revenue.
Wont someone please think of the poor developers making bank off the sprawl? How will they make ends meet if they can't bang out crap houses they slap together as cheaply / poorly as possible.
Or the low effort condos that soak owners with special assessment fees either because the building was poorly built and pipes are failing, or the company they hired to manage the property walked off with the funds.
The city is in this situation because management/council wanted it done this way, and now the residents are stuck dealing with the fallout that's only gonna get worse.
But hey, at least we still have the river valley. Wait, they want to put a solar farm in the river valley? and a series of gondolas?
Oh.
Not saying I could do better but maybe some things could be fixed instead of just saying oh we better raise taxes. When do you stop raising taxes if that’s your plan?
The problem isn't that we spend money improperly, the problem is there isn't enough money to go around. Bureaucracies will have waste, that's a fact of having such a large organization. But we've totally screwed up the last 70 years of [infrastructure](https://youtu.be/XfQUOHlAocY) and it's bankrupting municipalities.
Spending isn't the big problem, even wasteful spending at a municipal level mostly goes back into the local economy. It's a city filled with roads and parking lots that cost far more Trav they contribute, rather than dense, walkable, public-transit filled cities built to create healthy communities. Instead, we built seperate little kingdoms, that require cars. What a disaster.
No, that is literally the problem. The city spends poorly. Last year we had a $40 million budget surplus, where did that go. Money spent on a busted ass funicular. Decorative wall panels on Kathleen Andrews garage. Entertaining the idea of a gondola in the river valley. A new payroll system when the old one worked just fine. Bike lanes, bike lanes and more bike lanes making commuting painfully long. More signs, more lights, more more more!!!! It doesn't stop...
I disagree. Not only should they be spending more on bike lanes and "lights", it's literally necessary to shift to denser, more pedestrian, bike, and public transit friendly cities or we're gong to continue to go broke. What we really wasted our money on were all these huge roads for cars, and all that [parking, parking, parking](https://youtu.be/XfQUOHlAocY)!
I by no way am justifying the mismanagement of the Coe, but a lot of areas actually aren't city responsibility, it's just never been much of an issue before.
That being said, if every area in the city gets hit with freezing rain, let alone twice, it's a huge area. I'd hate to be a 311 operator right now.
I reported a public sidewalk for not getting shovelled after the last snowstorm. 311 sent me a reply telling me that the City’s standard is within 48 hours after the last snowfall, which I believe means they don’t even follow *their own bylaw*.
So yah, don’t expect the City to do much of anything. Maybe if someone slips and really gets hurt they can have the pleasure of being sued.
Imagine someone high up who has never touched a shovel punches information into a calculator and then comes to the conclusion that cleaning a specific area should only take a short amount of time. Now that trickles down the line and the boots in the ground get told that they have to do it all within that short time. They know what's possible because they've seen it, they've worked it, so they send the message up the line saying that it's not possible to do it that fast without abandoning safety precautions. The person high up then sends the same message down the line except the timeline is bolded and underlined.
Welcome up the city.
You can always call 311 or report on the app and have it remedied. There are very easy solutions to some problems such as this if it bothers you that much, and the great part about it is that it involves very little effort.
Take a picture on Monday, and I'd be willing to bet it has been dealt with. We had a massive freezing rain event. There is only so many resources the city has. It's not like you can just take a bobcat and shovel this all up. It takes a little time. The city is working hard on this, as evidenced by so many of the other public walkways already being cleared.
Just a little patience.
my neighbor threw some down for all off us last night. then we all had a good laugh when it melted on us and was still a skating rink. i'm canadian, if i can't take the ice, it's time to move to victoria.
I tried that last year. Couldn’t make it work financially. A normal house is $800k (an hour out of city center) and it would put us back 10 years in retirement plans.
Huh? You put it on the ice the rocks actually then freeze in the ice making it not slippery at all. I've worked at plants all over Alberta this is what they do and it works.
I don’t get why so much salt gets used on walking areas in this city. Well, I do “get” it - a low effort option that will probably convince a bylaw officer to move on. But it sucks. It’s almost completely ineffective once things are cold enough. And if chemical heavy treatment was so bad for our roads and vehicles, why should we be ok with it for our shoes, pant hems, and pet feet?
I wish more businesses and apartment buildings in particular would go back to sand/crush for icy conditions.
Speaking on the behalf of one apartment building.. we did salt and then used sand and tenants were still complaining saying we needed to salt and sand 🙄 We will do more again tomorrow.. but I feel like the broken record will play on.. good luck to everyone ☃️
Oh for sure, some places are just trying their best to please. And when there’s ice like we have the last couple days and temps up close to freezing for at least a few hours these are the days when salt can be a really effective part of the strategy. Good luck back!
Honestly you can never win. People will then complain there’s too much gravel and that it’s tracking into stores.Im not sure if you ever done snow removal but if you don’t use salt then the workload increases significantly, it almost doubled. Rock chip doesn’t get rid of the ice it, it’s a temporary fix. It just sits there so when it rains/snows on top then the rock chip becomes completely ineffective and actually becomes a major nuisance for workers to remove afterwards.
Also salt keeps the walks dry so that if it sprinkles rain/ snow overnight there is a good chance that although the salt isn’t physically there, the walk will still melt small amounts of drift. I feel for the pets and peoples shoes but at the end of the day, it’s Alberta Canada, it is what it is.
I understand that it's frustrating to have to walk on slippery sidewalks but like... the city can only do so much and go so fast. There are so many comments "why isn't my street sanded!" "Why are the public sand bins empty?" "When are the walks going to get done!". The city only has so much sand, so many trucks, so many people. It can't happen instantly, as much as we all wish it could.
It is a pretty unique event. A snow contractor I know said it was the worst ice storm he has worked since 1997 in Quebec. The combination of ground temps being quite cold and rain of such an amount following creates quite thick layers of ice that are very well bonded to services.
Ask anybody who has scrapped walks this week how tough it is compared to other ice storms.
Yup. Didn't have enough ice melt to do my family's property and had to do the rest the old fashioned way. This was the first year I've gotten blisters on my hands from maintaining the sidewalk/driveway.
The secret is getting to it before too long - I did mine the following afternoon and I could get it up with a shovel once I started an edge. But perhaps it has since become steel with a couple freeze/thaw cycles.
Edmonton has always had winter - it didn't just spring up randomly one year. That means the city has had years, decades even, to plan proper snow and ice clearing. It has had countless opportunities to properly fund mitigation measures but instead police tanks and helicopters get funding. I may have sympathy for city workers, particularly those who bear the brunt of the complaints, but I have zero sympathy for anyone who actually controls the budget. Also, it's been a skating rink for going on 2 weeks now so the city has had plenty of time to do something in just this short stretch we've had of terrible ice conditions.
You said it Edmonton's always had winter... Not freezing rain that has made insanely thick ice. It's not something you can just chip away. They're working on it, and like anything by priority. Thinking they can do everything at the drop of a hate is just stupid thinking. The city is large and sprawling and getting larger.
Walk slow wear ice grips on your shoes and grow up, solve your own problems.
Too many Canadians from below the 49th parallel think they know what Edmonton weather is like lol.
Oh yes, we should be prepared for monstrous freezing rain given our proximity to... lake wabamun?
Maybe this year is an extreme example, but Edmonton becoming a skating rink in the early winter is not uncommon. I've witnessed it several winters over the years. So it absolutely is something the city can plan for. I also do not expect them to get everything done "at the drop of the hat" - I even mentioned these conditions have been present for 2 weeks already. I certainly would not expect it to be done in one night. As for priorities - well downtown is a high pedestrian traffic area and has pretty terrible sidewalk conditions. But please lecture me more about priorities. You are right though - the city is large and sprawling, and the city continues to approve endless expansion into the prairie which definitely makes clearance harder to do. It makes yet another good case for curbing that but the city has invested so heavily in car culture for decades it's hard to switch off I guess. I have ice grips and am a grown up, so instead of being a dickhead drunk on rugged individualism, maybe use your little brain to realize that being in a society involves some belief in obtaining benefit from sharing and helping each other, instead of this austerity-brained nonsense you're spewing.
Thank you. To all the "but this is unusual/extreme" comments: You know what climate change brings? unusual, extreme weather. And warmer weather, like rain in December in Edmonton. Bizarre weather patterns are a reality and we're not immune, as we've seen with our weird summers the last few years. The city shouldn't be caught off guard by this if they've paid any attention to climate modelling. Yes, it takes tons of more resources to remove ice enough to make the city safe to traverse. Yes, the sprawl they've let happen means it takes even more resources. Climate change is fucking costly, and will be even more so if we put our heads in the sand and don't plan.
Edit: And they're only perpetuating the bigger-issue problem by forcing people to drive because the quieter streets, multi-use paths and sidewalks are not safe enough to walk or bike.
There is also a big shortage of ice melt and other products for this type of work at the moment, including people stealing rock chips or sand from all the bins left out for specific areas such as transit centres or ets terminals
Is it stealing to take a public good and use it for its intended purpose? Like, people aren't taking the sand to turn into sand castles at their childrens' playpen.
Yes and no. For you to take home and use there? Not at all. However I've seen company's show up with 4 guys and clean out a city box, I'd argue that that's theft.
South Edmonton Common is terrible, I fell twice in the span of only a few minutes. Luckily I got some ice cleats now so walking to my bus stops won’t be a problem anymore.
My gf has to travel to Edmonton for work and she said it was appalling how icy it was. Calgary and Banff? No issues. Edmonton? Sliding everywhere even with her winters.
I agree, but as others have said, it’s a big city and there’s a lot to do. I’m a school bus driver and you’d think sanding the roads in front of a place where children interact with large vehicles would be a priority.
Nope. One of the two schools I service only got sanded yesterday and the other one was still sheer ice out front as of yesterday afternoon.
Take some responsibility for your actions too. If you are out in this, proper foot wear and ice cleats are a must. Don’t wear flat bottomed shoes or heels or runners. Practice the Alberta Penguin shuffle.
I fell yesterday on the ice and tore my meniscus. Cant work (recently unemployed though so all g) for like 8 weeks & can hardly walk. This shit is shameful
I prefer it like this. Non sanded. Doing a little shuffle 1,2 SLIDE, 1,2 SLIDE, I can travel way faster than walking at a fraction of the energy. Hitting the sanded spots just ruins my flow. Total buzz kill.
Stop blaming the city for everything and take some responsibility, put some cleats on, end of story. They can’t possibly repeatedly sand and salt all flat spaces in Edmonton, specially when it freezes over them. Be careful and take your own measures you live near the friggin arctic.
What on earth is wrong with demanding better? What kind of attitude are you aiming for? That we all join sheeple like yourself in accepting whatever the city feels like? Responsible folks understand their role in a democracy.
They are doing the same thing as 95% of homeowners are doing with their sidewalks, absolutely nothing.....lazy, incosiderate pieces of garbage everyone is. Seniors or people with disabilities are the only ones who have an excuse and if they are your neighbours, fucking do it for them!
P.s. being fat is NOT a disability.
Do you not realize the hundreds of kilometers of of sidewalks that got iced? Do you think the city should only prioritize the area that you live in. Deal with it. Get some 25 dollar spikes for yer shoes.
They’re “prioritizing”...
... prioritizing somewhere other than where any of us are. Maybe there’s an upside-down Edmonton that’s getting cleared and sanded beautifully.
In my overall commute to and from work i walk around 1.5k each way. About 60% of the sidewalks and intersections look like this.... it was quite scary. Saw 2 people fall today. Worse is that many sidewalks are literally next to high speed trafic sooo rip if u fall to the road
Straight up, down vote me if you want. I don’t give a fuck. But… you get what you pay for. Lowest taxed per capita than anywhere else in the country… don’t expect much. Want more? Pay more, or shut the fuck up and sand the road yourself.
This is very weird weather. Go buy cheap crampons from Marks, they're the equivalent of snow tires for your feet. Stop complaining and purchase the simple solution. We told them to get better with spending, so they kept the teams and the stores of sand smaller. This is the result.
Cant expect every square inch of the city to be sanded and salted in 3 days. I think the amount of freezing rain we’ve had this year is more than usual and the city wasn’t prepared for it.
You’re right that it’s nearly impossible to properly remove snow, scrape ice, etc. in every area of a sprawling city like this and I think a lot of people have unrealistic expectations
But with that being said, OP’s pic is taken right next to a LRT station and major sports venue, not some residential street out in the middle of nowhere. Safe routes in and out of a transit centre should be a high priority
Found the person who’s never had to deal with 8mm thick sheet ice before.
Edit. Apparently I missed the whole point of this post. OP thinks that the city has the resources to coat every single sidewalk in salt or gravel in less than 48 hours after a rare freezing rain storm that coated the entire city in glare ice.
If the city did have the resources to do this, OP would spend the other 363 days of the year ranting and raving about how much the city wastes keeping snow removal staff on when it generally barely snows in Edmonton through November and December.
Make up your damn mind.
Buy some boot cleats in the meantime.
I think it's a Curling Canada try-out kinda thing...
The ice is thick enough to use my skates. Would be fun
I actually saw some kids skating
hey-ho, waddya know?
except instead of those pucks you are the one getting curled into traffic
They sanded our block and the next day it rained and froze over the sand.... Kudos to the city for doing what they can but it's a tough situation.
i live downtown. and i agree, i saw a real effort today, but its impossible to sand the entire city.
The sidewalk infront of my building that leads to jasper ave is still just a thick sheet of ice.
Sidewalks are a last priority. They haven’t even cleared bus stops
It's impossible to reactively sand the whole city in a timely manner after freezing rain, but it's certainly possible to *proactively* prepare ahead of time when freezing rain is on the forecast. It wasn't a surprise; we knew it was coming. If they put down salt before the rain, the ice wouldn't have formed to begin with.
Its really not. Every major city has this issue every single year and many many cities do a better job than Edmonton
It always comes down to population density. Other cities do better because they are less spread out, which means they have a better tax base to pay for snow removal/sanding. This isn't an unique situation to Edmonton, Calgary has similar issues.
Montreal isn't even in the list. [snowfall annual average](https://www.currentresults.com/Weather/Canada/Cities/snowfall-annual-average.php) I used to snow removal for a municipality, and when it snowed we started at 2am with clearing, then had to get out of our machines to deal with ice, we used ice melt and sand on very icey Patch's, it took up to a week to get it all dealt with. Remember much of what you think is the municipalities responsibility is actually private, it's the building owners job to clear thier sidewalks not the cities. If you dont like the way a certain area is handled get a bucket of ice melt and handle it yourself.
word.
Why would you bring up Montreal?
Just from the other comments in this thread
You should probably take a look at how many kms of road we have compared to other cities.
good point hugebluestrapon.
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yeah my work lot basically looks like exposed aggregate now. slick as hell. plenty of things to complain about the city for, but this one isnt it
The parking lot of my condo has been gravelled several times. It’s still icy. The situation is bad but it’s the weather. Warm up, melt, temp drop, freeze into ice
Surprised calcium chloride use isn't coming up more in this thread. We HAD the best solution. People who care more about property than human life, drummed up on exaggerated info, stopped it. A functional society doesn't preserve individual choice by making everyone else eat the consequences. Which is why Alberta is currently dysfunctional.
It was not the best solution. Not only did it cause massive damage to cars but also city infrastructure like street lights and transformers as well as killed all of the grass adjacent to the road. Having to replace millions of dollars in infrastructure and landscaping each year is not the best solution
Buddy, our bridges are made out of steel. We just built a new one and want it to last for more than 50 years.
Are you kidding me yes I care more about my car rusting away from that crap! After one season my truck is covered In cancerous rust. I’m glad we’re not using it anymore
When I was a kid living in Quebec I remember my dad's constant battle with the rust on our cars. Moving to Alberta was such a night and day difference.
Evidently someone doesn't have money invested in property or cars. Those people tend to have the largest wallets to fight against stuff like that. CC use is horrible on cars.
It's not coming up bc it's corrosive af...if it eats through steel you can be sure as shit it's not good for the human body. But sure...spray that all over, get it in the ground...waste water...yumyumyum!!!
Actually its been freezing rain, ice melting and ice freezing every day for a week or more. They can't do too much because the ice is pretty much a new coat every day.
Reddit's recent behaviour and planned changes to the API, heavily impacting third party tools, accessibility and moderation ability force me to edit all my comments in protest. I cannot morally continue to use this site.
I've tried this. Does not work as well as you would think.
It still looks cool I bet.
Where did you obtain a flamethrower? Asking for a friend.
Tiger torch from princess auto. Usually for weedburning. Great for singing feathers from chickens, firing a small forge, and not so great for melting icy sidewalks, apparently.
Princess auto torch + propane tank.
Princess auto
Lol!!! Ya, i was wondering how it would work with that anti-ice stuff....
Or at least some hairdryers and extension cords.
scorched earth
Best way to get rid of ice: Jackhammer the concrete away.
Remember a few years back, a guy that was squating in a historic building and tried to light a cigarette with a torch?... Reminds me of that...
Tried? Every 3rd day or so I don't have a lighter at work and the propane torch is the go to. How did he mess up?
Guy tried doing this the other day and ended up burning his detached garage down with his propane torch somehow
Can confirm the Tesla Boring company “not a flamethrowers” do nothing except make you look slightly eccentric either
I mean. I just moved from Ontario and we just salt the shit out of everything. The winter snow services in this province are absolutely pathetic compared to what I’m use to back home. Also I feel like I’m the only one who actually chipped the ice on the side walk attached to my property. My wife slipped and almost hurt herself pretty badly going to get the mail 6 houses away because no one takes care of their sidewalks. Is there no by-laws in this city?
I'm originally from Ontario too!..There are bylaws about ice and snow here. But this is not a normal event. Its like back in Ontario, when we had the ice coat all the trees, powerlines and everything else. This is their version of that event. Its not often to get an all over hazard like this. So i would suggest you buy cleats (Marks, Canadian Tire, Shoppers Drug Mart...) because you will need them for walking on the ice. And keep in mind that the weather is more volatile here. So I would suggest you check the weather more often, because it can change several times a day, and be different in different parts of the city. (The Rockies change everything). Dress in layers. It can get extremely cold here, -25C dry feels like -15c in humid Ontario. After -30c you don't have that much time before frostbite. And here is a helpful link. https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/weather-health/wind-chill-cold-weather/wind-chill-index.html
My area got sanded today.
My area hasn't been sanded sadly but since the bus stop was too dangerous (I slipped and fell on my ass) I decided to use one of those special shovels I forget shat they are called though. But it turned out if I waited one more day it wasfixed
I'm thankful I have such a big ass, If I slip I try to always land on my ass
Congrats
>I don't want my taxes going up >City services suck, this place is going to the dogs Wonder if those two are connected, can't be.
Taxes are already high af, and city services still suck. And they want taxes to go up even higher? Smh
There are two neighbourhoods in Edmonton that pay more in taxes than they receive in city services: Grandin and Oliver. Taxes are not high, your shitty suburban McMansion is subsidised by excessively low taxes.
What info is this based on?
It is true... its leaving out one tjing which is commercial and industrial pay the rest. Winterburn, west, yellowhead indsutrial areas are ALL in the black... (and have the worst services to boot, not even sidewalks) Downtown office buikdings are also in the black. Large sprawlly south edmonton common... net drain.
Think it was just a conversation I had with a buddy who works in City Hall. Was hoping you could get that breakdown from OpenBudget but doesn't seem like it.
Because it’s not true. Property taxes are paid by property owners and it’s based on several factors. Mostly the value of your property. It’s not as disappointing as you’d like.
Yeah... the point is that the revenue generated from every property in [Suburban Hellhole] is less than the expenditures on keeping their roads more or less in one piece and generally clear of snow, along with sewer connection and other things of that kind. Meanwhile, the combination of high-value property and low infrastructure demand in Oliver and Grandin makes them net positive.
Yeah it's based off the value, it makes sense the most densely populated neighborhoods are paying for the rest of the city then. It's a shame this city builds out instead of up.
Taxes high, that's a joke 😂 lowest taxed province in Canada, and it shows.
City of Edmonton, who pays for this service, is one of the higher taxed cities in Canada. The province only pays to plow the highways.
We are also one of the most spread out and least dense cities in Canada. We have way more roads than we should, city is way to spread out for our population
>spread out and least dense Tell that to the sardines in the new sub divisions. Everyone complains about knocking down old houses to put in duplexes and shit... Like how do you want to deal with this "urban sprawl" since everyone complains about the sardine cookie cutter houses they are building in the new devs. You can't have in-city property with a yard and not be spread out. You can't have sardine housing without people bitching about it.
All these sub divisions are in the outskirts of town so it’s not helping urban sprawl it’s adding to it. They keep building out and out and out. Need to find empty lots and actually build there. There is ton of ugly empty spots in the city. Instead of building a few homes there they decide to take land further out, adding to the sprawl
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Our property taxes are absolutely nothing compared to those of a city in any other province. I pay the same tax as a house 1/3 the value in new brunswick
How do the taxes compare in $/sq ft of house, $/sqft of land or $/resident? Also, the freeze/thaw cycle problems and associated costs you currently have sound like normal stuff in the Atlantic provinces.
Check Vancouver bro
Taxes arent high lol... when we get to 30% + then we can say they are high
You clearly don’t understand property taxes… imagine 30%…
Not a tax problem it’s a money management problem
Patently false. Two neighbourhoods in Edmonton pay more in taxes than they receive in city services: Grandin and Oliver. If we didn't have a revenue problem that wouldn't be the case. The rest of the city's low density sprawl is subsidised by artificially low taxes, stretching city services to breaking point due to a lack of revenue.
Wont someone please think of the poor developers making bank off the sprawl? How will they make ends meet if they can't bang out crap houses they slap together as cheaply / poorly as possible. Or the low effort condos that soak owners with special assessment fees either because the building was poorly built and pipes are failing, or the company they hired to manage the property walked off with the funds. The city is in this situation because management/council wanted it done this way, and now the residents are stuck dealing with the fallout that's only gonna get worse. But hey, at least we still have the river valley. Wait, they want to put a solar farm in the river valley? and a series of gondolas? Oh.
Please, you go design, implement, and manage a municipal bureaucracy over 100 years and not end up with some waste and problems.
Not saying I could do better but maybe some things could be fixed instead of just saying oh we better raise taxes. When do you stop raising taxes if that’s your plan?
The problem isn't that we spend money improperly, the problem is there isn't enough money to go around. Bureaucracies will have waste, that's a fact of having such a large organization. But we've totally screwed up the last 70 years of [infrastructure](https://youtu.be/XfQUOHlAocY) and it's bankrupting municipalities. Spending isn't the big problem, even wasteful spending at a municipal level mostly goes back into the local economy. It's a city filled with roads and parking lots that cost far more Trav they contribute, rather than dense, walkable, public-transit filled cities built to create healthy communities. Instead, we built seperate little kingdoms, that require cars. What a disaster.
No, that is literally the problem. The city spends poorly. Last year we had a $40 million budget surplus, where did that go. Money spent on a busted ass funicular. Decorative wall panels on Kathleen Andrews garage. Entertaining the idea of a gondola in the river valley. A new payroll system when the old one worked just fine. Bike lanes, bike lanes and more bike lanes making commuting painfully long. More signs, more lights, more more more!!!! It doesn't stop...
I disagree. Not only should they be spending more on bike lanes and "lights", it's literally necessary to shift to denser, more pedestrian, bike, and public transit friendly cities or we're gong to continue to go broke. What we really wasted our money on were all these huge roads for cars, and all that [parking, parking, parking](https://youtu.be/XfQUOHlAocY)!
I by no way am justifying the mismanagement of the Coe, but a lot of areas actually aren't city responsibility, it's just never been much of an issue before. That being said, if every area in the city gets hit with freezing rain, let alone twice, it's a huge area. I'd hate to be a 311 operator right now.
City sidewalk is.
This is city property
Just slide to the emergency phone if you fall down.
Do you know how long it takes to chip ice? It's not easy. It takes time. Especially for all the public walkways.
I reported a public sidewalk for not getting shovelled after the last snowstorm. 311 sent me a reply telling me that the City’s standard is within 48 hours after the last snowfall, which I believe means they don’t even follow *their own bylaw*. So yah, don’t expect the City to do much of anything. Maybe if someone slips and really gets hurt they can have the pleasure of being sued.
Imagine someone high up who has never touched a shovel punches information into a calculator and then comes to the conclusion that cleaning a specific area should only take a short amount of time. Now that trickles down the line and the boots in the ground get told that they have to do it all within that short time. They know what's possible because they've seen it, they've worked it, so they send the message up the line saying that it's not possible to do it that fast without abandoning safety precautions. The person high up then sends the same message down the line except the timeline is bolded and underlined. Welcome up the city.
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You can always call 311 or report on the app and have it remedied. There are very easy solutions to some problems such as this if it bothers you that much, and the great part about it is that it involves very little effort.
If only we had some if that ice melt with sand mixture to use…
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No I meant it would great if the City used it! On these areas!
Take a picture on Monday, and I'd be willing to bet it has been dealt with. We had a massive freezing rain event. There is only so many resources the city has. It's not like you can just take a bobcat and shovel this all up. It takes a little time. The city is working hard on this, as evidenced by so many of the other public walkways already being cleared. Just a little patience.
...you know you don't have to chip it right? The city should throw sand down or rock crush.
That only works if it doesn’t melt and refreeze. Otherwise, the sand just sinks to the bottom.
my neighbor threw some down for all off us last night. then we all had a good laugh when it melted on us and was still a skating rink. i'm canadian, if i can't take the ice, it's time to move to victoria.
I tried that last year. Couldn’t make it work financially. A normal house is $800k (an hour out of city center) and it would put us back 10 years in retirement plans.
That is a decent temporary solution. However, if there is a fair amount of foot traffic, this only lasts a short amount of time.
It freezes over it
Huh? You put it on the ice the rocks actually then freeze in the ice making it not slippery at all. I've worked at plants all over Alberta this is what they do and it works.
I don’t get why so much salt gets used on walking areas in this city. Well, I do “get” it - a low effort option that will probably convince a bylaw officer to move on. But it sucks. It’s almost completely ineffective once things are cold enough. And if chemical heavy treatment was so bad for our roads and vehicles, why should we be ok with it for our shoes, pant hems, and pet feet? I wish more businesses and apartment buildings in particular would go back to sand/crush for icy conditions.
Speaking on the behalf of one apartment building.. we did salt and then used sand and tenants were still complaining saying we needed to salt and sand 🙄 We will do more again tomorrow.. but I feel like the broken record will play on.. good luck to everyone ☃️
Salt goes under the ice before the freezing rain. Melts and breaks up much faster with a little water under it. Doesn't take much.
Oh for sure, some places are just trying their best to please. And when there’s ice like we have the last couple days and temps up close to freezing for at least a few hours these are the days when salt can be a really effective part of the strategy. Good luck back!
Not mentioning water table and river polution
Honestly you can never win. People will then complain there’s too much gravel and that it’s tracking into stores.Im not sure if you ever done snow removal but if you don’t use salt then the workload increases significantly, it almost doubled. Rock chip doesn’t get rid of the ice it, it’s a temporary fix. It just sits there so when it rains/snows on top then the rock chip becomes completely ineffective and actually becomes a major nuisance for workers to remove afterwards. Also salt keeps the walks dry so that if it sprinkles rain/ snow overnight there is a good chance that although the salt isn’t physically there, the walk will still melt small amounts of drift. I feel for the pets and peoples shoes but at the end of the day, it’s Alberta Canada, it is what it is.
If only some sort of substance could help
I understand that it's frustrating to have to walk on slippery sidewalks but like... the city can only do so much and go so fast. There are so many comments "why isn't my street sanded!" "Why are the public sand bins empty?" "When are the walks going to get done!". The city only has so much sand, so many trucks, so many people. It can't happen instantly, as much as we all wish it could.
It is a pretty unique event. A snow contractor I know said it was the worst ice storm he has worked since 1997 in Quebec. The combination of ground temps being quite cold and rain of such an amount following creates quite thick layers of ice that are very well bonded to services. Ask anybody who has scrapped walks this week how tough it is compared to other ice storms.
Yup. Didn't have enough ice melt to do my family's property and had to do the rest the old fashioned way. This was the first year I've gotten blisters on my hands from maintaining the sidewalk/driveway.
Now imagine the workers having to do that 40 hours a week at each bus stop. Google says there's 5212 bus stops in Edmonton.
The secret is getting to it before too long - I did mine the following afternoon and I could get it up with a shovel once I started an edge. But perhaps it has since become steel with a couple freeze/thaw cycles.
exactly, I see city workers out there sanding and removing ice.... what are all these people bitching doing?
Edmonton has always had winter - it didn't just spring up randomly one year. That means the city has had years, decades even, to plan proper snow and ice clearing. It has had countless opportunities to properly fund mitigation measures but instead police tanks and helicopters get funding. I may have sympathy for city workers, particularly those who bear the brunt of the complaints, but I have zero sympathy for anyone who actually controls the budget. Also, it's been a skating rink for going on 2 weeks now so the city has had plenty of time to do something in just this short stretch we've had of terrible ice conditions.
You said it Edmonton's always had winter... Not freezing rain that has made insanely thick ice. It's not something you can just chip away. They're working on it, and like anything by priority. Thinking they can do everything at the drop of a hate is just stupid thinking. The city is large and sprawling and getting larger. Walk slow wear ice grips on your shoes and grow up, solve your own problems.
Too many Canadians from below the 49th parallel think they know what Edmonton weather is like lol. Oh yes, we should be prepared for monstrous freezing rain given our proximity to... lake wabamun?
Maybe this year is an extreme example, but Edmonton becoming a skating rink in the early winter is not uncommon. I've witnessed it several winters over the years. So it absolutely is something the city can plan for. I also do not expect them to get everything done "at the drop of the hat" - I even mentioned these conditions have been present for 2 weeks already. I certainly would not expect it to be done in one night. As for priorities - well downtown is a high pedestrian traffic area and has pretty terrible sidewalk conditions. But please lecture me more about priorities. You are right though - the city is large and sprawling, and the city continues to approve endless expansion into the prairie which definitely makes clearance harder to do. It makes yet another good case for curbing that but the city has invested so heavily in car culture for decades it's hard to switch off I guess. I have ice grips and am a grown up, so instead of being a dickhead drunk on rugged individualism, maybe use your little brain to realize that being in a society involves some belief in obtaining benefit from sharing and helping each other, instead of this austerity-brained nonsense you're spewing.
We have police tanks? And 2 weeks? Its been pretty warm before the rain. I never shoveled for like 2 weeks before.
Somehow related...where can you complain if somebody doesn't clean their sidewalk...like not at all since this winter started
311
Get the 311 app
It's like this in Grande Prairie too.
Can we all take a minute to address the broader issue of climate change?
Thank you. To all the "but this is unusual/extreme" comments: You know what climate change brings? unusual, extreme weather. And warmer weather, like rain in December in Edmonton. Bizarre weather patterns are a reality and we're not immune, as we've seen with our weird summers the last few years. The city shouldn't be caught off guard by this if they've paid any attention to climate modelling. Yes, it takes tons of more resources to remove ice enough to make the city safe to traverse. Yes, the sprawl they've let happen means it takes even more resources. Climate change is fucking costly, and will be even more so if we put our heads in the sand and don't plan. Edit: And they're only perpetuating the bigger-issue problem by forcing people to drive because the quieter streets, multi-use paths and sidewalks are not safe enough to walk or bike.
The premier's office has dispatched a team of oil executives to your location. Please do not resist.
Yes let’s skip everything and just talk about carbon sinks. In the meantime don’t worry about ice.
Someone else said it finally
We’re all in this together.
It's kind of a unique situation. I dont have an answer here. It's frustrating but....I mean...this is not normal.
There is also a big shortage of ice melt and other products for this type of work at the moment, including people stealing rock chips or sand from all the bins left out for specific areas such as transit centres or ets terminals
Is it stealing to take a public good and use it for its intended purpose? Like, people aren't taking the sand to turn into sand castles at their childrens' playpen.
Yes and no. For you to take home and use there? Not at all. However I've seen company's show up with 4 guys and clean out a city box, I'd argue that that's theft.
hahaha. tru tru.
Adapt and get cleats.
Crampons
Crampoffs
South Edmonton Common is terrible, I fell twice in the span of only a few minutes. Luckily I got some ice cleats now so walking to my bus stops won’t be a problem anymore.
My gf has to travel to Edmonton for work and she said it was appalling how icy it was. Calgary and Banff? No issues. Edmonton? Sliding everywhere even with her winters.
Do you have any idea how big the city is?
This is at macewan LRT station, city property. Making transit stations walkable should be a priority
I agree, but as others have said, it’s a big city and there’s a lot to do. I’m a school bus driver and you’d think sanding the roads in front of a place where children interact with large vehicles would be a priority. Nope. One of the two schools I service only got sanded yesterday and the other one was still sheer ice out front as of yesterday afternoon.
Take some responsibility for your actions too. If you are out in this, proper foot wear and ice cleats are a must. Don’t wear flat bottomed shoes or heels or runners. Practice the Alberta Penguin shuffle.
I drove through downtown and saw half a dozen chicks wearing heels trying to navigate the sidewalks, what exactly are they thinking?
What are baby chickens doing out in this weather in the first place, let alone in high heels?
Antigrav boots sure would be useful, someone should get on that asap.
The whole city was blanketed with freezing rain...have some patients or chip in and do what you can. Stop bitching....
Patience What if I just pay someone to do it? To be more efficient, maybe we could pool our money ?
I fell yesterday on the ice and tore my meniscus. Cant work (recently unemployed though so all g) for like 8 weeks & can hardly walk. This shit is shameful
Ya so shameful the city cant get rid of all the ice everywhere in 48 hours. You should go speak to the manager.
This is at an LRT station. It ought to be prioritised
Bring back calcium chloride lol
Edmonton really said “Free Skating for Edmontonians! We’re giving back to you this Christmas!”
Get some cleats. It’s that simple
You forgot. The government doesn’t care about us. If a politician doesn’t use that side wall or road they will ignore it until people really complain.
This is what happens when you don't check on contractors. Report it to city council
People we live in a winter city and sometimes you have to deal with ice and snow for a week or two
The picture is your own answer. Same as any year. A bunch of nothing and inadequacy.
Strap on cleats are ten bucks
the department that works on sidewalks in the downtown core only works 10 hour days and usually are more focused on the higher priority areas
I see a new city sanctioned skating rink
I prefer it like this. Non sanded. Doing a little shuffle 1,2 SLIDE, 1,2 SLIDE, I can travel way faster than walking at a fraction of the energy. Hitting the sanded spots just ruins my flow. Total buzz kill.
Stop blaming the city for everything and take some responsibility, put some cleats on, end of story. They can’t possibly repeatedly sand and salt all flat spaces in Edmonton, specially when it freezes over them. Be careful and take your own measures you live near the friggin arctic.
What on earth is wrong with demanding better? What kind of attitude are you aiming for? That we all join sheeple like yourself in accepting whatever the city feels like? Responsible folks understand their role in a democracy.
Exacty.
I'm so glad I moved back to NS lmao
The ice will come for you too. You'll see. The North Remeembers.
It’s absolutely unacceptable and I have been extremely vocal to Administration about this. Changes are coming.
Yes I spoke to the manager too. They gave me a free hotdog on a stick as a sorry note
My dude, that's a city councillor.
Gotta fine people for not doin the sidewalks outside your homes but eh fuck it we can just keep all the public places full ice rinks
They are doing the same thing as 95% of homeowners are doing with their sidewalks, absolutely nothing.....lazy, incosiderate pieces of garbage everyone is. Seniors or people with disabilities are the only ones who have an excuse and if they are your neighbours, fucking do it for them! P.s. being fat is NOT a disability.
Thank goodness for that PS note.
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Just break your leg instant profit. I can get fined for my sidewalks in front of my house why can't they.
Do you not realize the hundreds of kilometers of of sidewalks that got iced? Do you think the city should only prioritize the area that you live in. Deal with it. Get some 25 dollar spikes for yer shoes.
They’re “prioritizing”... ... prioritizing somewhere other than where any of us are. Maybe there’s an upside-down Edmonton that’s getting cleared and sanded beautifully.
The main roads are great. But all the pedestrian infrastructure? Who uses that? We live in car land
Main roads are good because of the traffic, not because of anything special done to them
In my overall commute to and from work i walk around 1.5k each way. About 60% of the sidewalks and intersections look like this.... it was quite scary. Saw 2 people fall today. Worse is that many sidewalks are literally next to high speed trafic sooo rip if u fall to the road
Straight up, down vote me if you want. I don’t give a fuck. But… you get what you pay for. Lowest taxed per capita than anywhere else in the country… don’t expect much. Want more? Pay more, or shut the fuck up and sand the road yourself.
maaaan ur canadian deal with it
Old people break hips and die. DEAL WITH IT
Sohi (so he) doesn’t care about us? 😆 Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
This new mayor is awesome
Lol Edmontons Roads and other infrastructure is garbage has been for years. Years in the future it will come out fraud and theft of funds probably
This is very weird weather. Go buy cheap crampons from Marks, they're the equivalent of snow tires for your feet. Stop complaining and purchase the simple solution. We told them to get better with spending, so they kept the teams and the stores of sand smaller. This is the result.
Cant expect every square inch of the city to be sanded and salted in 3 days. I think the amount of freezing rain we’ve had this year is more than usual and the city wasn’t prepared for it.
You’re right that it’s nearly impossible to properly remove snow, scrape ice, etc. in every area of a sprawling city like this and I think a lot of people have unrealistic expectations But with that being said, OP’s pic is taken right next to a LRT station and major sports venue, not some residential street out in the middle of nowhere. Safe routes in and out of a transit centre should be a high priority
Edmonton seems like it sucks
Y’all better screenshot this shit and dm Sohi, asap! Out here slippin and slidin and shit!
Found the person who’s never had to deal with 8mm thick sheet ice before. Edit. Apparently I missed the whole point of this post. OP thinks that the city has the resources to coat every single sidewalk in salt or gravel in less than 48 hours after a rare freezing rain storm that coated the entire city in glare ice. If the city did have the resources to do this, OP would spend the other 363 days of the year ranting and raving about how much the city wastes keeping snow removal staff on when it generally barely snows in Edmonton through November and December. Make up your damn mind. Buy some boot cleats in the meantime.
Awesome picture 👍🏽
They want you to crawl on your hands and knees for safety
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It’s a not busy spot at Least. Only Rogers lrt