Snow removal in Colfax: “They’re doing the best they can.”
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BY THE WINDROW — Village of Colfax employees worked on windrowing snow on Balsam Street the week of January 23, blowing it into a dump truck and hauling it to Tom Prince Memorial Park to wait for the spring thaw. Some of the older residential streets in Colfax are so narrow that after snow is plowed, eventually, when cars are parked along the street, there is only room for traffic going one way.
—photo by LeAnn R. Ralph
By LeAnn R. Ralph
COLFAX — Once again, snow removal in the village was a topic of discussion for the Colfax Village Board.
At the Colfax Village Board meeting two weeks ago, Susan LaNou, owner of Deluxe Beauty Salon on Main Street, had asked if there was a different way to plow snow so her business would not end up with deep snowbanks overnight before village employees had a chance to remove the rest of the snow.
Rand Bates, director of Public Works, outlined the public works department’s snow removal procedures at the January 23 Colfax Village Board meeting.
If there is a snowstorm, and it stops snowing by 10 p.m. or 11 p.m., village employees will begin plowing snow on Main Street at midnight, Bates said.
If is snowing during the day and continues overnight, the village crew will do nothing until the following night, he said.
By that next night, the sidewalks have all been shoveled out to the street, and village employees can do the clean-up “in one shot,” Bates said.
Dunn County comes through and plows state Highway 40 multiple times during any particular snowstorm. Dunn County crews can be plowing 4-5-6 a.m., or 8 a.m., or 11 a.m., or in the afternoon, he said.
Once Colfax employees have windrowed the snow into the middle of the street, then the skid steer is used with the snowblower attachment to blow the snow into a dump truck and haul it out to the ball field parking lot, Bates said.
Village employees can go through with the snow blower one time, and “it’s done,” and then there is just a little clean up to do at the intersections, he said.
On Third Avenue, Fourth Avenue and Fifth Avenue [south of the railroad tracks in Colfax], the wing plow can be used to wing the snow out, Bates said.
But on Main Street and on other residential streets, the snow must be hauled out after being loaded into a dump truck, because there is no room to wing the snow out, he said.
Slushy piles
As a property owner and business owner with a building on Main Street that extends around the corner to River Street, with everything the village has done to move snow, “they have been doing a good job,” said Mark Johnson, owner of Cafe II Coffee Shop & Bakery and the Colfax Arts and Antique Mall.
The last two snowstorms,however, there have been two-foot slushy piles left along Main Street and River Street, he said.
It is the same problem from one end of the village to the other, Bates said.
Colfax does not have the manpower that Dunn County has, and village employees cannot be out plowing multiple times like the county does, said Jody Albricht, village president.
In one of the recent snowstorms it was still snowing an inch an hour at 8 p.m. The county opened up Main Street, and then the village went through and cleaned it up. The snow piled up next to the sidewalks was an inconvenience for a day, Bates said.
Traffic starts moving through town at 4 a.m. There are semi-trucks and trailers and other vehicles, and it’s dark, he said.
From the snow on Main Street, there will be a windrow four feet deep from one end of town to the other. Drivers are impatient. They cannot wait a couple of minutes for equipment to make room for them to get by, so then sometimes they drive up on the sidewalk to get around, Bates said.
If the snow cannot be removed from Main Street by 4 a.m., then it waits until the next day, he said.
If there are three or four inches of snow, the village’s equipment can blow that snow from Main Street into a truck in an hour. If the snow is heavier, then it takes four or five hours to blow the snow into a truck, Bates said.
“I get that it’s inconvenient (for business owners),” he said.
Parking spaces
Village employees could move snow several times in a night, “no matter what,” but this way, it only needs to be done once, Bates said.
If there is 10 or 12 inches of snow, Bates said he will take the skid steer and the snow blower up on the sidewalk so downtown businesses do not have so much to shovel.
If it snows overnight so the bulk of the snow removal is not done until the next night, could the snow from Main Street be piled into parking spaces along Main Street, leaving other parking spaces open?LaNou asked.
If it snows 10 inches, there is 10 inches of snow from the street and 10 inches of snow from the sidewalk all piled against the curb, she said.
The beauty salon has some older customers, and could the village face liability for not moving snow if the older customers slip and fall, LaNou wondered.
LaNou said she has pushed people out from in front of her shop, and she has pulled people out with her own vehicle from in front if her shop.
Travel advisories
There are days when the weather service and the county issue “no travel” advisories, Albricht said.
No one is forcing people to travel in bad weather, and it’s up to them whether they want to drive in the snow, he said.
Even if there are “no travel” advisories, people travel anyway, even if they should not, LaNou said.
“People are not going to stay home,” she said.
LaNou pointed out that Albricht’s grandmother was one of the people who always came in for a hair appointment on bad weather days.
Albricht said his grandmother should not have been out and about, but it was her choice, and in any case, his uncle had driven his grandmother to make sure she got into town and home again safely.
Priority
Johnson asked what the priority is for cleaning up snow, noting there is no parking on Main Street from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m., and no parking on River Street from November to May.
“Our priority is to get people out of town so they can go to work,” Bates said.
The priority is to get Main Street opened up, and then do the fine tuning and the clean up, he said.
What about people coming into town to work and to shop? Johnson asked.
The snow from the beauty salon sidewalk could be shoveled to the next spot away from the beauty shop so there is not so much of a bank in front of the shop, suggested Margaret Burcham, village trustee.
What about parking in the rear? asked Anne Jenson, village trustee.
Jenson, who is the owner of A Little Slice of Italy on Main Street, acknowledged that she is fortunate because she has off-street parking available for her customers.
There is no space available for parking in back of the building, The space that is there is for people who rent apartments in the building, LaNou said, adding that she does not own enough property to put in additional parking spaces behind the building.
Hours of hauling
A few years back, village employees would plow and then would haul and haul and haul loads of snow, Bates said.
The previous method of hauling and hauling and hauling was expensive and less efficient. The current method of removing snow is much more efficient, he said.
And what parking areas should be chosen to take the snow from Main Street until it can be hauled away later? Should it be parking spaces in front of Mark Johnson’s building? Should it be parking spaces in front of the post office? The pharmacy? Colfax Chevrolet? The Blind Tiger? Bates asked.
Snow piled up in parking spaces along Main Street would obstruct the view for people pulling out from intersections, Albricht said.
“Rand does as good a job as he can And he will continue to do his best,”Albricht said.
Since the discussion had started to circle around to the same points again, Albricht declared that it was time to move on and took up the next agenda item.
Cedar Street
Gareth Shambeau, manager of municipal services with Ayres Associates, reported that an informational meeting with Cedar Street residents had been held just prior to the village board meeting, with four residences being represented and five people in attendance.
No major issues or concerns were expressed that would delay the schedule for the street work, he said.
According to a timeline Shambeau provided to the village board, the final plans and specifications for Cedar Street were ready by January 20.
The village board was scheduled to approve putting out the project for bids at the January 23 meeting.
The project will be advertised for bids in the Colfax Messenger the week of February 1.
Bids will be opened on February 16 at 11 a.m., and then the bids will be tabulated and presented to the village board to accept a bid at the February 20 meeting.
The earliest start date for the Cedar Street project will be May 30, and the latest completion date will be September 1, according to the timeline.
The Colfax Village Board unanimously approved releasing the Cedar Street project for bids.
Village Trustee Gary Stene was absent from the meeting.
Other business
In other business, the Colfax Village Board:
• Learned that the Bobcat Compact Track Loader the village had approved for trade-in and purchase some time ago had finally arrived at Bobcat Plus in Chippewa Falls. Colfax was the last municipality to sign the purchase agreement and can still get the piece of machinery for the previously-agreed upon price of $4,200 with trade-in, Bates said. The Colfax Village Board unanimously reapproved the purchase.
• Approved purchasing an air-compressor controlled floating mixing apparatus for Lagoon 3 to mix in the alum to control the amount of phosphorus discharge at a cost of $8,134. The current Grid Bee “has been nothing but a pain and a nightmare,” Bates said. To date, the controller motor has been replaced 15 times, he said. If there is no mixer, there will be problems with phosphorus discharge that is above the limit set by the state Department of Natural Resources, he said.