Month: January 2020

I was going to write a cheerful post here celebrating the fact that this morning, as the State of Emergency was lifted, there were cleared and mostly salted sidewalks downtown. It was ahead of schedule (“early next week”). I planned to ask why the Mayor didn’t announce this bit of good news in his latest update, and let people know when they could expect the school routes and other priority sidewalks to be done. It would alleviate so much anxiety for people who have no other way to get around. It would be such good news. But then I read something that made me feel anything but celebratory. This CBC article is about my colleague, engineering professor Dr. John Shirokoff, who died a few days before the blizzard, after being hit by a car while walking to the bus stop. He was walking on the street because there was no cleared sidewalk. The Dean of Engineering, Dr. Greg Naterer, saw him not long before he died and said this:

A thing that will stay with me forever is his concern for his students at that time. Just before going into surgery, not complaining, not bitter, not really talking much about his pain, but his concern for his students… He was walking along the side of Elizabeth Avenue and, as we know, pedestrian safety and clearing of sidewalks is an issue in this city.… I don’t know what the answer is. But we need to do a better job. Pedestrian safety has to be right up there. It’s not like, secondary.

It was wonderful to walk around in the sunshine this morning, safely separated from vehicle traffic, but no, I don’t feel celebratory at all. Pedestrian safety is not secondary.

This photo is a year or two old. The whole area is completely buried right now after the blizzard of the century but I’m posting the photo because I added a story about it to the citizen science data gathering project designed by Matt Milner. If you have stories about your experiences getting around St. John’s in winter, especially accidents, injuries, hazards or the state of sidewalks in general, please have a look and add them to the map. Here’s the story that goes with this photo, in case you didn’t get here from Matt’s map: There’s a staircase that goes from Queen’s Rd. to Chapel St. that is always beautifully shovelled and salted yet it is truly the stairs from nowhere to nowhere because the sidewalk is never cleared on Chapel St. or that side of Queen’s Rd. It’s an example that I’m very familiar with since it’s on my route between home and work but there are others like this too. This illustrates two things: 1) the power of shovels, which might be better applied removing snow from some of the hazards documented by Matt’s project; 2) the City’s resources could sometimes be used better if the situation could be better analyzed. (Note: In the photo, you can see that it actually has been used because the snow wasn’t very deep but when the snow is deeper, it’s impossible.)

Update Jan. 24:

Even in the current state of emergency, they came and shovelled the staircase again. This time they did actually shovel a path out to the street, maybe because the depth of snow made to really clear just how futile it would be otherwise. Usually they don’t shovel a path, just leave it blocked at the bottom. Meanwhile, I was talking to a colleague who mentioned another such staircase that has even less traffic than this one but is also regularly shovelled and salted.

We have been under a state of emergency for two days now and the military has been called in to help clear up after the blizzard. Meanwhile, the weather has been sunny, neighbours have all been helping each other shovel out, and the streets yesterday and today were full of people walking, skiing, snowshoeing and snowboarding, enjoying the sunshine, each other’s company, and the freedom from the usual danger of getting hit by a car. For those of us who have been able to get out it has been an unheard of delight to be able to walk around without fear.

My friend, Marie Wadden, wrote eloquently on Facebook about the sense of community this engendered:

About being forced to [stay] in our neighbourhoods by this State of Snow Emergency: It’s kind of great, and makes me realize how cars strip us of community by expanding our reach so wide. My day was brightened by hearing from a more elderly friend how numerous of her neighbours have been to see her. I am making muffins for our neighbours who helped us yesterday, and I hope some new neighbours – from Angola – will take me up on an offer of a visit with us. Usually I am dashing in and out of the house to the car, hardly noticing those around me. Many have suffered from this “snizzard”, but it has this upside.

“Sidewalks are a fundamental element of the urban transportation infrastructure. It is bizarre that any city would fail to provide the same level of service for sidewalks that it does for roads. This makes its pedestrians second-class citizens.” (Barry Wellar, urban geographer and professor emeritus, University of Ottawa)

That really says it all. We are second class citizens. Worse than second class citizens. Our lives and our children’s lives are in danger. Just watch this video and read this description of peoples’ everyday commutes in St. John’s. We are working on a couple of protests and a citizen science update to the 2014 consultation and report on snow clearing in the city. But we already know how bad it is. We need to act.