Davenport crews working to convert ice rinks back into streets
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By Tory Brecht | Saturday, February 23, 2008 |
(Larry Fisher/Quad-City Times) Buy this Photo
The rumbling, crunching yellow beasts of the Davenport Public Works Department are breaking up the icy gridlock of residential roads at the less-than-spectacular average speed of one-half mile per hour.
While they rumble, many residents grumble — complaining their streets should not have become ice rinks in the first place.
But streets department staffers, city administration and aldermen who have been subjected to plenty of calls from frustrated constituents are defending the department’s work this winter.
Alderman Jeff Justin, 6th Ward, initially was pretty critical of the plowing, salting and ice-clearing efforts. But after meeting with workers Thursday night as they embarked on their road-scraping mission, he learned more about the problems vexing earlier clearing efforts.
First, snow and ice from previous plow jobs jammed many of the city’s catch basins. Then, when a heavy rain hit, stormwater pooled in the middle of the streets. The rain storm was followed by more snow and then plunging temperatures within hours, which left ice sheets up to 10 inches deep in some areas.
“In the last storm, we had freezing rain right before a 10-inch snowfall and it took us longer to get the emergency routes cleared,” said Keith Addison, a street supervisor. “By the time we got to residentials, it had turned frigid and it was frozen solid. The plows just rolled right over it.”
Street crews will spend the entire weekend trying to break up the roads-turned-bobsled tracks.
“The main thing is, they have developed a plan and they’re executing it,” Justin said. “We can’t control what Mother Nature does, but we can control how we react to it.”
Dee Bruemmer said approximately 220 miles of residential streets are ice-packed to some extent, out of the city’s more than 500 miles of streets.
“We are working 12-hour shifts with crews of three to allow the road grader to concentrate on blading,” she said. “Each blade can complete one-half mile of roadway per hour.”
At that rate, crews can complete 38 to 39 miles each day or 190 miles of streets by the end of Monday. They will salt each street at the conclusion of blading to increase the melting factor of the remaining ice, she said.
Kristin Bruchmann, who teaches private piano lessons at her home on Carey Avenue just south of Locust Street, is still waiting for the street scrapers. Her road has at least 5 inches of hard ice, but passing cars have dug a pair of ruts down the middle, allowing for dicey one-way traffic.
“You have to find rough spots on the glaciers to park, with your tires on the rough spots, if you want to get out,” said Bruchmann, who has gone through two, 40-pound bags of salt and countless newspapers trying to create a safe walkway from the street to her door for her students. “I don’t go outside without my big heavy nonskid boots, otherwise you’re flying through the air.”
Bruchmann said she appreciates the plow drivers, but questions whether the city was really ready for this type of weather.
“I understand extenuating circumstances,” she said. “However, I think there might have been a little bit of complacency because we haven’t really had a real winter for seven years. This is normal, this is what it’s supposed to be like in Iowa. And the city should know that.”
City Administrator Craig Malin isn’t convinced this is a normal winter.
“We design our streets and budget for staffing, facilities and equipment to meet a certain level of demand,” he said. “That is the fiscally responsible thing to do. But from time-to-time, Mother Nature outstrips your immediate ability to respond.”
Malin said the city will use this harsh winter as a learning experience and will look at possible ways to respond to differently. One effort he’d like to see is better regional planning for salt buying and consumption — most of the region ran out of salt in early February.
Further use of private contractors — which the city already employs — to help with snow and ice removal may be contemplated as well.
But the bottom line is there is a limit to what any municipality can do, Malin said. Just last Monday, he was stuck on Interstate 80 — which he called “the state’s most important road” — and had to turn back from a trip to Des Moines because of ice and snow.
“I think the work we’re doing now is evidence of the city being adaptive and going the extra mile to respond to the unique weather,” he said. “In the battle of Mother Nature versus man, Mother Nature wins every now and then. That should and does humble us from time to time.”
Tory Brecht can be contacted at (563) 383-2329 or tbrecht@qctimes.com.
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