No snow clearing this winter

[Steve O]

Chris Slatt posted this message from David Goodman of the Arlington County Staff on the Arlington County Bicycle Advisory Committee list serve this morning:

From: David Goodman
Date: Wed, Oct 30, 2013 at 4:33 PM
Subject: re:Status of snow plowing plan for Arlington’s Trails?

Dear Mr. Slatt,

I’ve been asked by the County Manager to respond to your question about the status of Arlington’s snow operations plan vis a vis trail clearing. As you stated, staff did prepare a proposal last winter for the County Manager’s consideration that would expand the County’s snow clearing operations to include 13 miles of high-priority trails. Generally, the proposal was to fund, for a single winter, a test program that would have paid a contractor approximately $10,000 per snow event to clear 13 miles of priority trails. (During a typical winter – if there ever is such a thing – snow clearing operations are mobilized about ten times.) Thus this proposal would have reflected an approximately $100,000 budget commitment.

Given the County’s financial status at that time, it was decided that this could not be accommodated in the FY2014 budget proposal. Nonetheless, the proposal will be raised again during this next fiscal year’s budget discussions, taking place in the coming months. If the budget change request is accepted, I will be sure to brief the Bicycle Advisory Committee accordingly.

Thank you for your comments.

David

David J Goodman – RA, AICP
Bicycle & Pedestrian Programs Manager
2100 Clarendon Boulevard, suite 900
Arlington, VA 22201
703.228.3709

As I have told the committee before, if Arlington continues to insist that it somehow deserves to be considered for a Gold Bicycle-Friendly Community certification from the League of American Bicyclists, I will personally go down to their offices and lobby to have it rolled back to Silver. No community that treats its bicycle and ped transportation corridors as second-class to its roads deserves to consider itself somehow among the elite communities in the United States.

Topic

[ShawnoftheDread]

@OneEighth 68495 wrote:

No internal combustion here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLFE1D5F0B0F46A7AD&v=ZAPk9xo6sVE

But there are no pedals.

[OneEighth]

@ShawnoftheDread 68497 wrote:

But there are no pedals.

Like on a moped?

[Rod Smith]

MBT is plowed every time it snows. Come ride it if you want to be robbed and beaten.

[Rod Smith]

I try to avoid the secondary streets also. When it gets deep, stay on the primary thoroughfares.

[OneEighth]

Just to clarify—I’m not making an argument for or against ebikes here. I’m just expressing concern that if the trail system is just another transportation corridor, it becomes much more difficult to restrict it’s use.

[dasgeh]

@OneEighth 68557 wrote:

Just to clarify—I’m not making an argument for or against ebikes here. I’m just expressing concern that if the trail system is just another transportation corridor, it becomes much more difficult to restrict it’s use.

There are plenty of transportation corridors that limited allowable forms of transportation (railways, highways come to mind). Can you provide an example of the creep you’re worried about (outside of the ebike debate)?

[OneEighth]

That’s the thing about unintended consequences—it isn’t always the issue you identify that comes back to bite you.

All I’m saying is that anytime you challenge how people view something, you risk them re-evaluating in ways you don’t want or expect. Just my opinion. No one has to agree. It’s not like whether I’m right or wrong is going to be determined on this forum.

Frankly, I’m not sure how one justifies separate infrastructure just for horses, pedestrians, and bicycles without the recreation element. If it’s just about transportation, why not allow under 50cc scooters to use cycling infrastructure? What makes pedals relevant?

Just food for thought. Take it or leave it—up to you.

[dbb]

@OneEighth 68605 wrote:

It’s not like whether I’m right or wrong is going to be determined on this forum.

Isn’t that Dismal’s role?

[rcannon100]

What would be useful is if someone did a cost benefit analysis:

* Average number of snowfalls in Wash DC (well actually Arlington) per year (dont base policies on extremes like snowmageden).
* Average number of bicycle commuters that time of year
* Cost of clearing the trails
* Benefit of clearing the trails (meaning how much time would the trails be impeded absent clearing; and with a clearing, how, well, available trails are).
* Environmental cost of clearing the trails (if for instance deicer is used)

Back of the envelop math

Current results per winter
Average number of days of snow 8.1
Average total accumulation 14.5 or less than 2″ per event
“These averages don’t show how much the snowfall in Washington varies from year to year. In December, for instance, one in four years totals over 2.5 inches of snow. Another 25 percent of years receive no snow for the month.”
“About half the days with snowfall in Washington leave just a skiff, amounting to less than an inch, of fresh snow on the ground. “

NOAA has the average January snow fall at 6.2 inches

According to Bike Arl data, at the Custis Rosslyn counter, in Jan. 2013, on an average thursday there was 905 bikes counted. I will presume a significant portion of those were two way trips (to and from). Trail traffic counts varies greatly from peak to winter. Add to this that not all of these are Arl residents and Arl taxpayers who would pay for the plowing.

How long does snow last on the ground in Washington? We the average snow fall is not deep. My personal experience (lived here 50 years) is that most snowfalls are gone almost in the first day they are here. Weather.com has the average high temperature in January as 43. That, and solar, is sufficient to melt a dusting of snow.

Of course the problem is that the average low temperature is 29. In other words, what melts in the day freezes at night. Why are Wash DC drivers so bad. Well there are lots of reasons, but a big one is that our winter storms involve a lot of ice. Plowing is ineffective in this situation.

Oh, here is another variable. Where snow events in Wash DC are significant, the Fed. Govt goes on Liberal Leave status and schools close. This will reduce on that day the number of cyclists desiring to bike to work (by how much, I dont know).

How much does snow removal cost? I have seen costs all over the place. But VDOT budgeted last year $55m for snow removal for NOVA. Snow removal can be expensive. And it if we want it on the trails, it might require special equipment. And it might require rebuilding the trails to make them compatible with snow removal.

Plowing has been known to damage the surface the road. Rebuilding trails after plowing would be an added costs (roads frequently have to be repaved in the springs of major storms). And the use of deicer / brine has been criticized by the ecological movement. Wikipedia. Since our trails go by ecologically sensitive environments and are in parks, this is of particular concern (roads have storm drains – while the brine may be problematic there too – it goes into drains, not ponds and streams).

Finally, consider that many jurisdictions would have to be brought on board for this to work. Custis is Arlco. WOD is NVPRA. MVT is NPS. (And given the environmental impact, I doubt NPS will ever get on board).

Finally, do cyclists have alternative routes? During a small event…. probably on road. During a major event… I dont think I would want to be on a road even if plowed. But a significant portion of cyclists can take public transportation.

Okay, so what does this add up to?
* Probability of an event is small
* The events themselves are generally small
* The length of the impact is generally small
* The benefit of plowing in terms of time that it would open the trail (over not plowing at all) is likely small
* The problem of ice will not be solved so much by plowing
* Ice could be solved by deicer, but there is an environmental impact
* The cost may be significant
* The number of cyclists who benefit may be limited. (a few hundred)

So…. um…. this isnt actually meant to be an argument. This is meant to be a cost benefit analysis. This is suppose to be just the facts. In other words, if this is wrong, what facts support it being wrong.

The only opinion I have is I hate policy based on extreme conditions. Snowmageden was extreme. Snowmageden resulted in Arlco passing what I consider to be a highly questionable snow clearing ordinance (one that Arlco itself does not comply with – they do not clear all of county or APS sidewalks – or we would not be having this discussion). To me, the only Snowmageden argument that can be made is that Snowmageden is indicative of climate change, and that winters around here are going to be worse than the data from the past suggests. In other words, looking at previous performance is no indicator of future grown.

[DismalScientist]

@dbb 68609 wrote:

Isn’t that Dismal’s role?

That was a one time only offer. Everyone was adequately warned in the first post of that thread.:rolleyes:

[DismalScientist]

Why is the snow clearing ordinance questionable? It seems to be standard operating procedure in Northern cities.

Hint: Google “snow clearing ordinance.”

[dasgeh]

@rcannon100 68610 wrote:

The only opinion I have is I hate policy based on extreme conditions. Snowmageden was extreme. Snowmageden resulted in Arlco passing what I consider to be a highly questionable snow clearing ordinance (one that Arlco itself does not comply with – they do not clear all of county or APS sidewalks – or we would not be having this discussion). To me, the only Snowmageden argument that can be made is that Snowmageden is indicative of climate change, and that winters around here are going to be worse than the data from the past suggests. In other words, looking at previous performance is no indicator of future grown.

I agree with and appreciate the rest of your analysis. I’ll even agree that I don’t think GENERAL policy should be based on extreme conditions. But given that Snowmageddens happen, I do think we should have a policy in place for when they do happen. E.g. General policy (i.e. average snow event): no clearing trails. Large snow event: clear trails.

What’s large? Above a certain depth? Maybe a weather forecast for cold weather (i.e. no melting) for at least X days?

That seems reasonable to me. Saying “no, we won’t allocate 0.05% of our budget to clear trails” does not.

[rcannon100]

That is good thinking.

The question that has to be asked – and again this is just looking for facts I dont have – snow clearing generally incurs fix costs. Whether we clear the trails or not – there are annual fix costs (equipment, etc). What are those costs? (probably the cost of equipment and training).

Again to Snowmageden, most everything was closed during that storm. The county could not even clear the streets.

So I guess that ads to your question – not just if it gets deep enough, clear…. but at what point “its so deep, dont bother, everything is closed anyway.”

[lordofthemark]

@rcannon100 68610 wrote:

What would be useful is if someone did a cost benefit analysis:

* And the use of deicer / brine has been criticized by the ecological movement. Wikipedia. Since our trails go by ecologically sensitive environments and are in parks, this is of particular concern (roads have storm drains – while the brine may be problematic there too – it goes into drains, not ponds and streams).

That still does not quantify the harm – we still put lots of deicing out there – on roads, and on private property.

Also one could look at specific trails to see the impacts. In particular what is the impact on the Custis – in someplaces it runs along neighborhood parks, but in some places it seems to be in a less environmentally sensitive location.

[lordofthemark]

@rcannon100 68617 wrote:

That is good thinking.

The question that has to be asked – and again this is just looking for facts I dont have – snow clearing generally incurs fix costs. Whether we clear the trails or not – there are annual fix costs (equipment, etc). What are those costs? (probably the cost of equipment and training).”

My impression is that this would be done under contract – so would not permanently be owned by the County or using county personnel. Snow plowing contractors routinely plow places on private property that are not necessarily wider than a MUT, so this need not involve incremental training (Im not sure how prioritizing after a snowfall would be done however)

[Author]

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