Red Deer city crews continue to clear the streets after the first major snowfall of the year.
As of Wednesday, crews have finished ploughing and removing snow from the Priority 1 — hills and bridges — and Priority 2 — arterials and high collision intersections — areas in the city.
Public Works manager Greg Sikora said the crews are continuing with sidewalk ploughing, which includes transit stops on arterial and collector roads.
Crews will continue doing hand work on the areas where the equipment cannot get into, which includes intersection islands, staircases and bridge decks.
“We’re continually sanding slippery intersections,” said Sikora. “Basically that gets us to more or less we’re at the point where we completed all the duties that have been triggered based on our priority system.”
Over Saturday and Sunday, 33 cms of snow fell in Red Deer causing havoc on city streets and area highways.
Sikora said the city is receiving calls for sanding at some slippery intersections. He said the city is continuing to monitor the sanding and deploying when necessary throughout the city.
In the meantime, Sikora is encouraging drivers to use caution when driving on the winter roads.
Cpl. Al Nicholson of the Innisfail Integrated Traffic Unit said that last weekend Hwy 2 was quite treacherous and incidents have slowed down. As of Wednesday afternoon, there had not been many reported incidents.
Nicholson said a new coating of asphalt was put down on Hwy 2 south of Red Deer this year and that may have caused some of the problems.
“They don’t put chip coating down the first year so it makes it a little more hazardous than it was last year,” said Nickolson. “When we get ice and snow on the highway it does create a little bit more of a hazard.”
The traffic unit covers Hwy 2 from Red Deer to Didsbury.
“Winter driving conditions are a bit of a learning curve.,” said Nickolson. “You go from dry pavement to winter icy driving conditions. We want to be cognizant of the distance and the speed and to leave the cellphone somewhere else.”
A mix of snow with a high of zero is in the forecast for today. There’s a 40 per cent chance of flurries in the late afternoon. It will get chilly overnight with a low of -5C.
crhyno@www.reddeeradvocate.com