Welland tickets 150 vehicles parked on the street during snowstorm

Niagara | Welland | Community | Traffic |

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Published November 22, 2022 at 12:46 pm

While it was no picnic, Saturday's snowstorm in Niagara only dumped 25 cm (10 inches) in most municipalities.

After Welland got 60 cm (two feet) of snow dumped on their streets during the January Blizzard of 2022, they issued a stern warning to their residents.

Keep your vehicles off the road during storms as it makes plowing roads even harder, they said.

Even though they repeated that warning prior Saturday (November 19) night’s snowstorm that dumped 25 cm (10 inches) on their 595 km of paved roads, some residents ignored the edict.

The end result? Roughly 150 cars were fined $65 each for street parking and impeding the path for snow plows.

Last January, Welland laid down the law. “The City would like to remind residents that parking on the streets during winter operations is prohibited. Plows need adequate space to move around parked vehicles, and when this occurs, it creates snow build-up.”

Welland CAO Steve Zorbas said last January despite the fact that street-side parked cars were slowing down the plowing, the city nonetheless got bombarded with calls from residents, demanding to know when their street would be plowed.

The same scenario played out in Niagara Falls, St. Catharines and the balance of Niagara as streets were clogged for days.

“I know some residents are frustrated that their road wasn’t plowed as quickly as they’d like, but our crews have been working around the clock,” said Zorbas after the January 17 blizzard. “When this much snow falls in such a short period, it can delay things, but we are steadily making our way through the city.”

With the weekend’s snow storm, which saw about a third to half of the snow as January’s storm, municipalities closest to Lake Erie got hit the hardest – Fort Erie, Niagara Falls, Port Colborne and Wainfleet.

However, with the entire region recovering from the weekend and road mostly plowed, Niagara is facing a new issue as the day-time highs of 5C and 6C is melting the snowpiles and freezing temperatures at night are turning streets into skating rinks.

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