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Winter Stopped by for Valentine’s Day

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Though there was no white Christmas, Winter decided to show some love and gave western Washington a white Valentine’s Day.  It’s not exactly what everyone wanted, but it’s the thought that counts, right? So smile and say thank you so Winter doesn’t get mad and give us a white Earth Day.

Seeing the forecast, and reflecting on the 2019 storm, the city of Auburn prepared for the weekend snowstorm. Ingrid Gaub, City of Auburn Director of Public Works, explained that the city will apply a de-icer, a salt water mix, to roadways prior to a winter event if weather permits. “If the roads are wet, de-icer will wash away before having a beneficial effect. The City placed de-icer on roadways prior to this event.”

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source: VRFA, Twitter

According to Gaub, de-icer is a treatment used pre-event to help prevent ice from forming. Roadways must be dry when placed. “Sand and salt mixtures are used on top of snow to help melt snow and ice and help with traction after snow and snow ice mixtures have accumulated.”

Learning from the 2019 snowstorm, the city deployed staff to the roadways before the storm was predicted to arrive Friday. This meant commuters coming home early to ‘beat’ the storm did not hinder staff deployment as the storm began.

The city’s five plows were working from noon on Friday in 12-hour shifts and continued through Monday afternoon. “We [did have] one [plow] break down that has been out of service for a portion of that time. This is very similar to what occurred in 2019,” Gaub said.

Despite plows continually working throughout the weekend, some roadways had large amounts of snow or appeared to not have been plowed at all. According to Gaub, temperatures over the weekend were colder than the 2019 storm, with shorter breaks and less temperature increase between snowfalls.

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“The snowfall began much later in the day (evening hours) and the temperatures dropped well below freezing early in the snowfall,” explained Gaub. “This lead to a very compact snow and ice layer between Friday night and Saturday morning. When this exists, plows cannot break through that layer until it begins to warm up, which happened Saturday about mid-day allowing the plows to get to the roadway surface in many cases but not for all locations.”

Plows focused on priority routes Friday into Saturday morning. Secondary routes began late Saturday. “This is actually faster than we were able to get to secondary routes in 2019,” Gaub said.

Only two roadways required closure over the weekend (105th Pl SE and Lake Tapps Hwy), said Gaub.

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WSP PIO Trooper Rick Johnson reported that “two weekends ago Friday through Monday the Washington State Patrol troopers in King County responded to 96 collisions. The same timeframe during #Snowpocalypse2021 this weekend they responded to 386 collisions!” This is an increase of just upward of 300%.

Lesson: only go out if you need to.

An animated Gif of Christopher Walken in a winter setting

Walken in a Winter Wonderland

Clearing walkways of leaves, snow, and debris is the responsibility of the adjacent property owner. This means the city is only responsible for clearing sidewalks adjacent to properties it owns (i.e. City Hall). “The remainder of downtown and the transit center are the responsibilities of the adjacent property owners,” Gaub said.

With rain and “warmer” temperatures expected this week(don’t get excited the highest high we see is 50° on Sunday), our Valentine’s Day gift from Winter will be gone as quick as that box of discount candy you’ve got on your grocery list.

According to Gaub, “The City has not added any new plows. These are expensive pieces of equipment that are not used often and therefore the expense of buying an additional piece of equipment that will be unused for 95% or more of the year is not a cost effective use of taxpayers’ money.”


 

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