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The winter that wouldn't seem to die and what it cost us
Plowing city streets cost $9.5 million this year as the snow came down in great sheets of white

CBC.ca
April 23, 2018
Colin Butler

It's the winter that wouldn't seem to die and, according to the man at the helm of London's fleet of snowplows, it cost us big bucks.

"We spent a lot of money for this winter season," said John Parsons, the city's manager of transporation and roadside operations.

"We were on course for the coldest April ever." Geoff Coulson

In January, February and March alone, the city spent $9.5 million on keeping city streets clear of snow, compared to the $6.5 million the city spends on average.

"It was a very long winter," Parsons said. "We would normally be done the first week of April. We would have had a lot of our bike lanes swept in March, but we still have crews around in case we have a small event."

74,000 tonnes of salt

Parsons said this season kept crews busy, who worked long hours to keep drivers safe on London's 3,500 km of roads.

"We can't stop providing the service," he said. "There's provincial standards and there's expectations. People need to get around for commerce and the economy, so we need to get the work done."

Snow plow operators normally work an eight-hour shift, but Parsons said this winter saw some shifts stretch into 13 hours, with the plows themselves on the road for up to 24 hours a day during some of this winter's bigger storms.

"Talking to them in the lunch room they were getting tired," he said. "I think [this winter] is over."

Ding-dong the winter's dead

Environment Canada meteorologist Geoff Coulson, who has the official word on the changing of the seasons, agrees. The 2017-2018 winter season is finally dead.

"It is, finally, I'm very happy to be able to say that, especially after the ice storm we had last weekend, the bitter cold we had for much of the month of April," he said.

Coulson said this winter season saw 220.2 cm of snowfall, which isn't far off from the long-term average for the region, which is 194.3.

"It isn't that much more," he said. "The month that really stood out as being snowier than normal was January, where we picked up 79.9 cm of snow, long-term average January snowfall is 49.3 cm, but pretty much every month the snowfall was a few centimetres of normal."

Coulson said the real story this winter was the variability, from the bitter cold snap the week of Boxing Day to the milder than normal March.

"December was colder than normal, January was a little colder than normal, March was a little milder than normal and without the warm up this month, we were on course for the coldest April ever," he said.

Couslon said while there are no big warm ups on the horizon anytime soon, temperatures are expected to consistently stay in the double-digits for the foreseeable future.

"I'm just really, really glad we're heading into more spring-like weather."

This winter by the numbers: