Winter Walking and Cycling

[timc]

“In the past we typically saw people either yelling at drivers or throwing shovels at the trucks, but it seems to be escalating to the point where people are trying to enter the vehicles and get to the drivers and attack them. So, we’ve been looking at mitigating measures to deter that kind of behaviour through potentially the use of forward-facing camera technology,” Henderson said.

What is wrong with people?

[danbrotherston]

City of Waterloo handed out more than 350 fines for snow clearing concerns

According to data collected by the city, bylaw officers received over 2,122 complaints about sidewalk clearing. Although that number is similar to the winter of 2024/2025, it is a 240 per cent increase compared to 2023/2024.


Bylaw officers gave out 799 orders related to snow clearing, performed 209 clean-ups and handed out 353 fines.

Given that in one year, I submitted about 200 complaints in Kitchener, but 0 in Waterloo because their complaint line never answered once in all the times I tried, then 2000 complaints seems both high and low.

Honestly though, this report is pretty weak. It gives zero indication as to how the sidewalk clearing is performing, only that "the complaints were the same as last year, and more than the year before". I'm going to guess the 240% increase isn't even about complaints, but about them actually manning the damn phone. 

Also: “In the past we typically saw people either yelling at drivers or throwing shovels at the trucks, but it seems to be escalating to the point where people are trying to enter the vehicles and get to the drivers and attack them. So, we’ve been looking at mitigating measures to deter that kind of behaviour through potentially the use of forward-facing camera technology,” Henderson said.

This is insane. How about we treat people who attack snowplow drivers with the same disdain that many in our community (even our community here) treat the unhoused population and go and bulldoze their houses? Or maybe, we can just charge them with the crimes they're committing. I think cameras and such are probably unnecessary for that (although perfectly valid to install) given that these people are emotional (and unhinged) enough to engage in criminal behaviour right outside their house.

[MidTowner]

City of Waterloo does accept complaints about sidewalks online.

2,122 doesn't seem like a high number to me. The fact that 40% of them resulted in orders suggests there's a real problem. It takes time for officers to go out, during which sidewalks could (but apparently aren't) be cleared. Some complaints will just be unreasonable or will not understand the standards. Not many, though, apparently.

[danbrotherston]

City of Waterloo does accept complaints about sidewalks online.

2,122 doesn't seem like a high number to me. The fact that 40% of them resulted in orders suggests there's a real problem. It takes time for officers to go out, during which sidewalks could (but apparently aren't) be cleared. Some complaints will just be unreasonable or will not understand the standards. Not many, though, apparently.

That's not necessarily what that statistic means, it could also mean means properties are generating multiple complaints, bylaw gets 3 complaints, but for the same property = 1 citation. 

It might not even be the same person, a sidewalk that gets a complaint, bylaw might not reach it before another storm comes, and then the original complainant might send another complaint 2 weeks later because the sidewalk remains uncleared, we know the delay on bylaw enforcing a sidewalk can be a month or more depending on the weather.    

Given the effort to complain, I think it's pretty unlikely that people would complain unless it's a persistent annoying problem. (Especially because people know that bylaw doesn't really do much for a long time).

Before I became an activist about it, I did call bylaw from time to time, but only for problems that were persistent, like sidewalks being completely blocked for months because property owners weren't trimming their bush. Even then, bylaw took another 6 weeks to arrive, and then still issued a citation. Two weeks later, the city did the work to clear it. All told, sidewalk blocked for 6 months. On Victoria St.

Think about whether we'd tolerate a major road being blocked for 6 months. You'd literally have a mob in city hall demanding the mayors head on a pike.

So yeah, I don't think it's a lot compared with the number of actual problems...but I think it demonstrates just how bad the sidewalk maintenance is. You can probably multiply by 1000 or 10,000 the number of times a sidewalk is in violation of the bylaw (and the bylaw is already pitifully bad). But for people to submit complaints 2000 times you're seeing only the tip of the iceberg, which is already huge.

And that's great that complaints can be submitted online. They couldn't be when I was there. And similarly for Kitchener. It was so frustrating. I'd literally call bylaw as I was walking up King St. or wherever and make a list of properties while I was on hold. By the time I got connected, I'd give them a list of 20 or 30 properties with uncleared sidewalks. But most people aren't willing to stay on hold for 10-20 minutes and memorize a list of 20-30 addresses. Most people will do as I do before...ignore it for weeks, and only after enough annoyance, send a complaint.

[creative]

I issue complaints online, which is really easy to do, and usually see a quick response. I’m not waiting in a phone cue. I felt sorry for the young couple that bought the former student rental house across from me. They had to pay all the outstanding fines as the house went into receivership with a private lender.