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Winter Walking and Cycling
(02-16-2019, 09:11 PM)the_councillor Wrote:
(02-14-2019, 02:26 PM)MidTowner Wrote: It is. The bylaw is clear in the standards it imposes on property owners. Very few property owners are in compliance with it for any length of time during the winter. Those are not the standards the municipal government would set for itself if it didn't delegate the work.

This is correct and we will fix it.  The notices to those that made a legitimate effort was an unintended consequence.  Bare pavement is service level the city/region cannot achieve in many cases and should not be applied to residents IMO.  Something like "Safely/Accessibly traversable" makes more sense than "bare pavement" and gives bylaw the discretion they should have.

This seems like a positive next step in figuring out how to improve the situation. It looks like staff will have found out that it is impossible to enforce the bylaw as currently written. That would be a good lesson from this winter's proactive enforcement pilot.

But I think it will be found that it's hard to enforce any bylaw. "Safely/accessibly traversable" makes a lot more sense to me, too. But it's not hard to imagine property owners complaining because, in their opinion, the sidewalk was safe (just as some rightly complain now because they did clear the sidewalk). How would those kinds of disputes be adjudicated? Staff need to have discretion to do their jobs, but they are human and do sometimes err in exercising their discretion, so there need to be processes to address property owners' disagreements.
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I think the salt use point is an interesting one. It's not immediately obvious to me that city clearing would lead to greater salt use. Have any studies been done?
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(02-16-2019, 09:04 PM)the_councillor Wrote:
(02-02-2019, 09:43 AM)ijmorlan Wrote: Hey, where is that, I need to pick up some salt for my driveway!

(I know where it is, just funny to think that enough salt to supply my house for a season is probably dumped like that in each of many locations every time there is a large snowfall)

More seriously, you’ve located another example of bad-faith argumentation. Those people don’t really care about salt; if they did they would bring it up as a separate issue applying to all snow clearing, not as a “but, but, but…” with respect to City clearing of sidewalks. It’s like people who say “shouldn’t we consider Hyperloop?” when an LRT project is about to begin construction — usually they don’t really want Hyperloop, which doesn’t actually exist now anyway, they just want to stop the LRT project. And I’m sure there are other examples.

Or maybe you don't know me.  Maybe I do care a LOT about salt use, water quality, and habitat protection.  Maybe I engaged staff and a close friend in water-protection to understand the implications of hundreds of tons more salt in our community.  Maybe I've engaged staff on ALL salt use and you just aren't aware of it.  But hey... I'm a politician.  An easy target to slam and get lols from your bros.  Surely I'm not some guy researching and doing the best I can to make the best possible decision.  Keep throwing out "bad faith" and saying I "don't really care"  that's why I'm here writing this on a Saturday night on long weekend...

I don’t know you, but I know logic well enough to use it.

If you care about salt use, you bring it up in the context of “what can we do to use less salt?” not in the context of “we can’t add a few percent to the City’s snow-clearing area because we’d have to use more salt!”. Do you vote against road construction because it would increase the salt use?

You could easily take the salt used for the sidewalks from the road salt allocation. A small reduction in the amount of salt used on the roads wouldn’t make much difference, but moving that salt over to the sidewalks so they are cleared properly would make a huge difference to pedestrians. Another approach would be to use beet juice on the sidewalks, leaving the salt use unchanged by the addition of sidewalk clearing. I understand beet juice is more expensive than salt, but the sidewalks are much smaller than the roads.

Of course, all of the above ignores that residents are already using lots of salt on sidewalks, and this usage would disappear with the advent of City plowing.
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(02-16-2019, 09:35 PM)the_councillor Wrote:  
Yeah so not sure how to respond except to say I wrote the below paragraph literally just before the cherry-picked quote above that questions my compassion.  Sigh... c'mon man.

"I am not ignorant of the challenges of those who have trouble getting around our city. I fully agree that we must work toward better support services for those otherwise unable to clear their sidewalk, like many seniors and people with disabilities, but for the rest of us, cleaning sidewalks is a duty of home ownership."


Proof:
https://www.therecord.com/opinion-story/...-bad-idea/

Paying taxes is also a duty of home (actually property) ownership. Why are you so fixated on having sidewalk snow clearing as part of the duty of home ownership? I, and many, would rather pay a little more tax and not have to worry about the sidewalk any more.

Here’s a dose of reality: having the City clear the sidewalks is a tax decrease, not increase. Right now, I must pay my taxes, and clear the sidewalks. The value of my labour to clear the sidewalk, or the amount of money I must pay somebody to do so, is higher (actually, much higher) than the amount of tax increase required to cover City service. OK, strictly speaking it’s a property ownership obligation decrease, but that doesn’t quite roll off the tongue in the same way.

So the real question is: why you are opposed to reducing taxes?

Another way of looking at this is to apply all your arguments to road clearing. Why is it not an obligation of home ownership to clear the bit of road in front of my house? Before you answer, you might want to think very carefully about whether whatever you say also applies to the sidewalk.

Oh, and by the way, I don’t like the implied throwback to the 1950s, when everybody was neighbours and everybody helped each other and everything was peachy keen. Some things are better handled by more organized cooperation, which is all democratic government is.
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I just realized I should mention my sidewalk snow clearing idea, now that we have a new reader on the forum.

Basically, I was thinking that a bunch of people on the same block could get together and hire the same snow clearing company to do the sidewalk for the entire block. This would be cheaper than having 25 separate companies come and each do one house.

Then I thought, what if a whole neighbourhood did the same? Probably even more savings!

In fact, the whole city could run one hiring process and hire one company to plow all the sidewalks in the city. This would be cheaper than running dozens of separate processes all through the city.

Of course, at this point, each individual property owner couldn’t be directly involved in the process. So I can imagine a bunch of ways of doing this, but one simple way would be to divide the City up into 10 or so areas and have each one choose somebody to participate in the process on their behalf. Maybe the entire City could choose an 11th person to oversee the whole process and help keep the area representatives focussed.

I think this could work pretty well. If it does, we could imagine expanding it to other areas — maybe the same group of people could hire people to plan and build roads and parks, for example. That’s more speculative, but I think it just might work. If successful, this idea might be useful for all sorts of services that are needed by everybody in the City.
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I just want to chime in and give my two cents:

I personally have no problem whatsoever clearing my sidewalk.  As I've mentioned before, ours is the clearest on our street, always down to the concrete, full-width.  It takes me about 30 seconds to do on top of my driveway and since I stay on top of it, it never gets to the point where it's a chore.

THAT BEING SAID, I HATE the current system because I feel like I can't even go on vacation or up to visit my parents for a weekend, because... what if it snows?  Then I'm screwed, I'll get dinged.  So I live in fear, and am frantically out there constantly worrying all winter that I'm going to break the rules that the City has set up.  They've turned what should be a positive thing into a negative thing and making people live in fear seems like an absolutely terrible way to run a community.

So there needs to be a severe adjustment in the method of ticketing and enforcement.
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I'm really surprised about some of the environmental arguments in support of property owners clearing sidewalks. It seems to me that one benefit of having the city clear more/all of the sidewalks would be that staff could be trained on best practices regarding salt usage. Some property owners use minimal salt, others seem to rely on it as their main tactic for keeping the sidewalk clear. Consistent practices from city staff seems like one way to manage that concern.

Also, more importantly in my mind, if we are talking about the best environmental practices, it would be to create a walkable city where people do not need to have a car to move around. Clear sidewalks help support exactly that. I've been disappointed with the number of suggestions that rely on cars as the answer to unclear sidewalks. Most of the places I need to get to on any given day are less than 3 kms from my home - an easily walkable distance...in theory. Unclear sidewalks can make those walks tricky at best or treacherous at worst. 

Relying on bylaw enforcement seems like a poor way to build a great city. In fact, I would suggest that we only rely on enforcement techniques when a system is designed poorly. For example, if you create wide, clear roadways, you need police to enforce speed limits as everything about the design suggests cars should go fast there. It's the same for sidewalk clearing. If you have a poorly designed system (relying on the goodwill of every single property owner) you need to rely on bylaw enforcement to ensure people follow the rules. I would suggest that it's time to rely less on enforcement and more on creating a better system.
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One thing I want to add about the 50's throwback comment.

Things were different back then: Disabled people were usually institutionalized. People were generally younger (less old folks). Families kept together, so none of these single parent families working 3 jobs to make ends meet. And weather was different, winter was winter, not this bouncing around weather we see today. And no mobility issues even if sidewalks were covered. No scooters existed back then to highlight issues.

As my parents used to say about walking to school "we'd trudge through 3 feet thick snow, 4 miles both ways, and up hill!" So, according to my parents, there parents, and the times I went to school (now about 40 years ago), sidewalks were rarely cleared.
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The whole issue of salt use is an interesting one. Walking around DTK, there were definitely side walks that were dangerously icy and it was apparent that the homeowner had used an abundance of salt to little effect. Once ice accumulates, like it has in front of these homes, clearing the ice is an arduous task for the city or the homeowner. It didn't have to be that way, though, plenty of their neighbours had sidewalks clear to the concrete. It's clear, though, that those homeowners where ice accumulated wer slow to respond to the snow accumulation and the result is far more difficult for everyone to deal with.

In those cases, the best approach, both in terms of getting rid of the ice, and in terms of reducing salt use, is to spread a conservative amount of salt, allow it to reach the base where it will help loosen the ice from the sidewalk, and then go at the ice with a metal shovel or spade. I'm not sure there's a suitable approach the city could take at this point that wouldn't be unreasonably labour-intensive.

That said, this entire situation would likely have been avoided if the snow was removed promptly. The ice layer wouldn't be as thick, and salt would be more effective. This is true for roads as well, for what it's worth.

I wonder if it's possible to have split responsibility. The city would clear snow with plows, but homeowners are still responsible for making sure sidewalks and pathways on their property are safely passable. In most cases, that would require no intervention on their part, in some cases, it might mean spreading a bit of sand or salt or going out with a shovel when accumulation is particularly severe.
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(02-16-2019, 11:43 PM)the_councillor Wrote:
(02-16-2019, 11:32 PM)tomh009 Wrote: As a non-profit site, we are all volunteers, and unfortunately none of the mods were online earlier this evening. 


FYI: New members' posts are initially moderated to enable us manage the spam levels, not to block discussion.

Ahhh... so I shouldn't wait long going forward?  That's better, Thanks!

There are not so many mods, so no guarantees. Moderation status might last for a week, not sure on that. In the meantime, will try to check in more frequently.
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(02-17-2019, 02:43 PM)tomh009 Wrote:
(02-16-2019, 11:43 PM)the_councillor Wrote: Ahhh... so I shouldn't wait long going forward?  That's better, Thanks!

There are not so many mods, so no guarantees. Moderation status might last for a week, not sure on that. In the meantime, will try to check in more frequently.

Thanks to all the volunteers that make this site happen which allows for some important conversations to happen. Great work!
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(02-17-2019, 02:23 PM)jamincan Wrote: The whole issue of salt use is an interesting one. Walking around DTK, there were definitely side walks that were dangerously icy and it was apparent that the homeowner had used an abundance of salt to little effect. Once ice accumulates, like it has in front of these homes, clearing the ice is an arduous task for the city or the homeowner. It didn't have to be that way, though, plenty of their neighbours had sidewalks clear to the concrete. It's clear, though, that those homeowners where ice accumulated wer slow to respond to the snow accumulation and the result is far more difficult for everyone to deal with.

In those cases, the best approach, both in terms of getting rid of the ice, and in terms of reducing salt use, is to spread a conservative amount of salt, allow it to reach the base where it will help loosen the ice from the sidewalk, and then go at the ice with a metal shovel or spade. I'm not sure there's a suitable approach the city could take at this point that wouldn't be unreasonably labour-intensive.

That said, this entire situation would likely have been avoided if the snow was removed promptly. The ice layer wouldn't be as thick, and salt would be more effective. This is true for roads as well, for what it's worth.

I wonder if it's possible to have split responsibility. The city would clear snow with plows, but homeowners are still responsible for making sure sidewalks and pathways on their property are safely passable. In most cases, that would require no intervention on their part, in some cases, it might mean spreading a bit of sand or salt or going out with a shovel when accumulation is particularly severe.

I have not encountered a city cleared sidewalk that had ice this weekend and I have done a lot of walking.

Perhaps with a lower LOS, that would happen, but at the current LOS seen in DTK, on the trails, and on at least one city cleared sidewalk outside DTK, there is no ice issue, and generally, a reasonable amount of salt has been used to achieve bare pavement.

As for a split responsibility, I suspect that's going to have even less compliance than we currently see with snow clearing bylaw.
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(02-17-2019, 08:51 AM)ijmorlan Wrote: I just realized I should mention my sidewalk snow clearing idea, now that we have a new reader on the forum.

Basically, I was thinking that a bunch of people on the same block could get together and hire the same snow clearing company to do the sidewalk for the entire block. This would be cheaper than having 25 separate companies come and each do one house.

Then I thought, what if a whole neighbourhood did the same? Probably even more savings!

In fact, the whole city could run one hiring process and hire one company to plow all the sidewalks in the city. This would be cheaper than running dozens of separate processes all through the city.

Of course, at this point, each individual property owner couldn’t be directly involved in the process. So I can imagine a bunch of ways of doing this, but one simple way would be to divide the City up into 10 or so areas and have each one choose somebody to participate in the process on their behalf. Maybe the entire City could choose an 11th person to oversee the whole process and help keep the area representatives focussed.

I think this could work pretty well. If it does, we could imagine expanding it to other areas — maybe the same group of people could hire people to plan and build roads and parks, for example. That’s more speculative, but I think it just might work. If successful, this idea might be useful for all sorts of services that are needed by everybody in the City.

See you've got it backwards. What people should do if they are good caring citizens is get together and shovel off the road in front of their houses. Save tax dollars and get even more exercise! Live near a park; you gotta go shovel that too if you walk your dog there or run on the paths.
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(02-17-2019, 10:29 PM)clasher Wrote:
(02-17-2019, 08:51 AM)ijmorlan Wrote: I just realized I should mention my sidewalk snow clearing idea, now that we have a new reader on the forum.

Basically, I was thinking that a bunch of people on the same block could get together and hire the same snow clearing company to do the sidewalk for the entire block. This would be cheaper than having 25 separate companies come and each do one house.

Then I thought, what if a whole neighbourhood did the same? Probably even more savings!

In fact, the whole city could run one hiring process and hire one company to plow all the sidewalks in the city. This would be cheaper than running dozens of separate processes all through the city.

Of course, at this point, each individual property owner couldn’t be directly involved in the process. So I can imagine a bunch of ways of doing this, but one simple way would be to divide the City up into 10 or so areas and have each one choose somebody to participate in the process on their behalf. Maybe the entire City could choose an 11th person to oversee the whole process and help keep the area representatives focussed.

I think this could work pretty well. If it does, we could imagine expanding it to other areas — maybe the same group of people could hire people to plan and build roads and parks, for example. That’s more speculative, but I think it just might work. If successful, this idea might be useful for all sorts of services that are needed by everybody in the City.

See you've got it backwards. What people should do if they are good caring citizens is get together and shovel off the road in front of their houses. Save tax dollars and get even more exercise! Live near a park; you gotta go shovel that too if you walk your dog there or run on the paths.

This argument isn't lost on me.  I suppose I disagree with the distinction between what is the "City's" and what is the "Resident's".  In my mind, we are one.  We're owned, controled, and voted in by the residents to be caretakers of our city, with a mission to make it the best we can.  I don't see parks and trails as "city" property, it's everyone's property, same as roads community centres, libraries, and yes sidewalks.

Surely it's impractical to ask residents cut grass in our parks, or shovel snow on our roads due to the amount of work but it's not impractical to ask them to do their part for their city in clearing their sidewalk.  In most cases people are clearing the driveway anyway, it takes little time to do your sidewalk as well.  It's quite literally the only service we ask of those physically able.
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(02-17-2019, 10:46 PM)the_councillor Wrote: This argument isn't lost on me.  I suppose I disagree with the distinction between what is the "City's" and what is the "Resident's".  In my mind, we are one.  We're owned, controled, and voted in by the residents to be caretakers of our city, with a mission to make it the best we can.  I don't see parks and trails as "city" property, it's everyone's property, same as roads community centres, libraries, and yes sidewalks.

Yes, the sidewalk is on the boulevard, so it is actually also "city property" (or "everyone's property"), the same as roads, community centres and libraries. So the question is, why do we make the distinction and download the responsibility for clearing those to the people who live in the houses next to the sidewalks?

As jeffster pointed out, this is not the 50s any more. More people are working, there are more single-parent families and more older people. And our expectations for making the city accessible to everyone are also (I hope) higher than they would have been in the 50s.

In any case, I think everyone (?) can hopefully agree that the current bylaw/enforcement is not achieving its goals, so what next?
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