As the snow continues to fall, the bills are piling up for the City of Estevan.
The incredible volume of snow that has fallen on the area throughout the winter, but especially within the last month, has forced the City to mobilize much of its workforce as well as local contractors as they attempt to keep up with Mother Nature.
Estevan was hit with an estimated 10 to 15 centimetres of snow on Friday and received another eight to 10 centimetres Sunday and into Monday morning. The latest blast had City crews out early Monday morning to hit the Priority 1 streets. Crews were also at work Tuesday morning windrowing snow in the downtown core.
City manager Jim Puffalt said their primary focus since mid-January has been snow removal. Although he was unable to provide an exact dollar figure as they are still tabulating their costs, Puffalt said it's safe to say the final total is not going to be small.
"We've had all of our loaders and graders out and working so that is four or five pieces of equipment and four to five employees basically going 10 hours a day, so it starts to add up," said Puffalt.
Aside from the obvious hit to the City's wallet, Puffalt said the constant snowfall is taking its toll on their employees who have been called on to put in a lot of hours in the past couple of months.
"It's becoming quite wearing, but our people are handling it well," he said. "They are professionals and have been dealing with this for years, but it just gets a little hard on people, and it's hard on our equipment and hard on people who are trying to drive around the city. It's been tough to keep up."
Puffalt said he has been pleased with the City's reply to the snowfalls. He noted in January they decided to clean up the majority of residential areas, a move that gave them a little extra capacity.
"It gave us some area to have the snowpack down. I don't know where we would be otherwise; I'm sure we would have been removing snow the last couple of weeks."
While the snow is obviously the current focus, Puffalt said they are wary of what will happen when it begins to melt. As has been well documented, roads in Estevan are in terrible shape and it will be at least a month before the City has asphalt to make repairs. They have been using cold asphalt in the interim, but that is nothing more than a temporary solution.
"We have multiple projects to look after at this time of year. We have some snow being moved around, we have people on pothole patching and then we have to have people on steamers to keep the water moving. It's a very hectic time of year for us."
The forecast for the next week calls for snow on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. The temperature is expected to begin rising next week with a high of three degrees for next Wednesday but a high of eight degrees by April 1.
