Meeting is Jan. 21
When the last dump truck/snow plow was purchased in 2011, the old one was kept to give Scandia three snow plow routes.
Scandia residents who do not live on a state highway or county road get snow removal from the city. If they are unhappy with the service, they call the city to complain. Complaints have been few in the past two years, according to council members and city staff.
At the November work session, the Council voted to keep three plow routes, and in December they voted to hire another maintenance worker. Now the public works department wants another reliable truck.
Anticipating this need, in 2013 the council voted to borrow an extra $200,000 when bonding for a new fire truck. That vote was not unanimous.
At the Jan. 8 work session, the council voted 3-2 to put a truck purchase on the agenda for the next meeting on Jan. 21.
Kieffer recommended a Mack chassis with single axle, heavy front end, no engine brake, side wing, no underbody and a six-inch salt sander. The price would be $190,000. The amount added to the equipment certificate was $200,000.
Simonson, Ness and Swanson voted in favor.
“Two plow trucks is not enough for this many roads,” Swanson said. “What if one goes down? The third one is not safe. There are a lot of roads here, and we’ve had the best snow plowing in many years.”
Jim Schneider
Schneider and Lee voted no.
“We don’t need it, can’t afford it, and have no place to put it,” Schneider said. “I’d rather use the money for a backhoe, paver or wood chipper.”
A backhoe might cost less than $200,000 and a wood chipper about $35,000.
Scandia has its own salt storage in this building behind the fire station.
Schneider argued that residents complained in years past because the previous crew started at 7 or 8 a.m. instead of 3 or 4 a.m. and had to get salt from the county. The current public works department starts early, he said, and the city now has its own salt shed.
Schneider said the city already has the resources to do three routes: two snowplows, two pickups and a road grader. The grader should be used for snow removal, he said, instead of going out only to grade gravel roads in the summer.
“It takes a lot to learn to run it properly,” he said, but the benefits are less gravel thrown in the ditch from gravel roads and better ice removal on paved roads.
Scandia uses the John Deere road grader in the summer to maintain gravel roads. It can plow snow but must be followed by a separate vehicle if roads are icy, to spread salt on paved roads or rock on gravel.
Instead of winging gravel off to the side like a snowplow does, Schneider said, the grader blade depth can be set to leave a half inch of snow to be driven on and packed down.
The finer settings and weight of the grader also give it the ability to peel off ice. “The grader is the only tool for that,” he said.
Schneider said Scandia residents just need to get to work in the morning after it snows; they do not need the road to be entirely cleared of snow. The snowplow crew can go back and clean curb-to-curb the next day.
Kieffer disagreed. “If we had 20 miles of gravel, we would use the grader” for snow removal, he said. Scandia has 92 miles of paved city streets and 5 miles of gravel roads.
Instead of using the grader on paved roads and going back another day to finish and apply salt, Kieffer said, the best practice is usually to get all the snow cleared before traffic has packed it down, and to apply salt as soon as possible.
“The sooner we get chemical applied, the better it will work,” he said. “We’re not having to go back to treat the roads. We’re in and out, saving time and fuel and making the road safer.”
With a truck, clearing snow and applying salt are done in one pass. “It’s more cost-effective to have three trucks,” he said.
Gravel roads needing more traction get an application of quarter-inch rock from a pick-up truck, which is already on hand to clear cul de sacs and dead end roads. At the Otisville Landing and 197th Street, he said, a pickup applies rock while plowing. On Old Marine Trail and 185th, which have few hills or curves, a snow plow is used.
Kieffer said he plans for 25 snow events a year, but last year his crew went out more than 30 times. This year they’ve already been 10 times. Salt use is a major environmental concern, but Kieffer said Scandia spreads an average of 24 tons of salt during each snow event, less than the rate recommended by the University of Minnesota.
Kieffer has 15 years of snow plowing experience, having worked at White Bear Lake and Hugo before taking the Scandia job, and has attended many conferences on snow and ice control.
Maintenance worker Mike Egelkraut, who has been at Scandia for seven years, said the road grader was used for snow removal only in 2010, a year with much snow.
“We used it because it has a 12-feet wing to clean a wider path and give us more place to put snow the rest of the winter,” he said. Snowplow trucks have a 10-foot wing.
Downtown parking on snow days
A new ordinance will be written to deal with parking in downtown Scandia. Business owners on Olinda Trail (CR-3) have complained when snow was not cleared to the curb because of parked cars.
In 2011 the Council discussed prohibiting overnight parking there in winter months, but a landlord assured the city that renters would move their vehicles when it snowed. That “gentleman’s agreement” is no longer working, the Council decided.
County Engineer Wayne Sandberg presented options, including changing city code or asking the county to issue a localized parking restriction. Current city rules that limit parking to one hour between 2 and 6 a.m. on city streets do not apply to county roads.
Sandberg said county snowplows usually leave between 3 and 4 a.m., but they may make multiple passes over two days. He showed city ordinances from Hugo, Forest Lake, Oak Park Heights and Cottage Grove that limit the length of time a vehicle can be parked during certain hours in snow season.
Cory Farver, highway maintenance chief for the county, suggested Scandia use an April end date instead of March, because a 6-inch snowfall has occurred as late as April 22.
If the county is asked to restrict parking, Sandberg said, the county would install signs. The sheriff’s deputy who provides police protection in Scandia would have to enforce the parking restriction even if there was no snow, and the signs would be up for years.
A city ordinance, on the other hand, is relatively easy to change. Mayor Randall Simonson said he prefers local regulation.
At the May 20 road tour, Olinda Trail residents complained that mail was not delivered because parked cars blocked access to mailboxes. The new parking ordinance will also deal with that issue, and with street parking of RVs, boats, campers and trailers.
A draft ordinance will come before the Council at the Jan. 21 meeting.
Downtown Scandia business owners complained when Washington County snowplowers were unable to plow to the curb after a recent snow event.