A motion calling for a “snow summit” received a chilly reception at the New Westminster city council table.
New Westminster city councillors Daniel Fontaine and Paul Minhas put forward a motion calling for a “snow summit” in Metro Vancouver to review the impacts of recent climate events on Metro Vancouver, particularly the Nov. 29 snow storm that resulted in gridlock on many roads and bridges in the Lower Mainland.
Their motion recommended that Mayor Patrick Johnstone, as the city’s representative at Metro Vancouver, introduce a motion requesting that a snow summit be held as soon as possible to review and analyze the circumstances that led to a “record level of traffic gridlock” in the region on Nov. 29. The motion also stated that Anvil Centre be offered as a possible venue for the summit, which should include representatives from the Ministry of Transportation, Metro Vancouver, BC Ambulance, TransLink, ICBC, Mainland Contracting and senior officials from municipalities in the region who could speak on behalf of first responders, including fire and police.
The call for a snow summit was defeated in 4-2 vote, with only Minhas and Fontaine supporting the motion. Mayor Patrick Johnstone and councillors Ruby Campbell, Tasha Henderson and Jaimie McEvoy voted in opposition.
“On Nov. 29, our region faced what many have referred to as an unprecedented emergency event. The snow began to fall, and within a matter of hours, our entire region was in gridlock,” Fontaine said. “What would normally take one hour to get home was now taking 12. Major bridges linking the south and north side of the Fraser River were inoperable. And whether it was the Alex Fraser, the Port Mann or the Deas (George Massey) Tunnel, they all failed miserably.”
While the event was, in many ways, unprecedented in its impact to citizens, Fontaine said it wasn’t in terms of the actual snowfall.
“It was by no means the biggest snowfall we've ever received, not by a longshot. It wasn't the coldest of the cold spells. No, this was merely a few inches of snow timed during rush hour that literally brought our region to its knees,” he said. “Crowded buses could go nowhere. Cars and trucks, even with snow tires, were stranded at the bottom of hills and provincial off- and on-ramps. Taxis were stuck in the mayhem. I've referred to it as the night of 100,000 stories. So many people couldn't make it to critical appointments. No doubt, ambulances struggled to reach 911 calls. And our fire trucks and staff were left struggling to deal with an overflow of calls.”
Fontaine said Lower Mainland municipalities did their best to keep their roads clear, but he, along with Surrey councillor Linda Annis, believe a “snow summit” is needed to consider exactly what happened and why.
“We thought, perhaps, that given the significant impacts to our economy, to our citizens, that it would be a no brainer to bring everyone under one roof … to find out what went wrong, and are there policy or procedural changes that need to happen to prevent another Snowmageddon? Interestingly, our requests to both Metro Vancouver and to the Minister of Transportation have gone unheeded. As they say, crickets. It's now Jan. 9,” he said at Monday’s council meeting. “And we have few to no answers to the critical questions of what exactly happened on that November night. And we still face the prospect of more snow this winter.”
Following the Nov. 29 snow event, Delta Mayor George Harvie wrote to B.C.’s Transportation and Infrastructure Minister Rob Fleming asking that the province re-evaluate the government’s contract for winter road maintenance. (Harvie wrote in his capacity as Delta’s mayor, but he is also the chair of Metro Vancouver’s board of directors.)
“It is vital that he snow response plan for provincial highways and crossings of the Fraser River is sufficient and that the necessary resources are in place to prevent traffic gridlock and the failure of our provincial transportation system,” he wrote. “With increasing unpredictable weather patterns, B.C.’s provincial transportation network must have the necessary preparations in place with adequate resources for winter maintenance.”
In his letter to the province, Harvie said many Delta residents were stuck in gridlock on the provincial transportation network for upwards of nine or 10 hours.
“It is very concerning that, while the transportation network was failing, commuters were still continuing to try to enter the transportation system,” he said in his Dec. 2 letter. “As such, I also request that a review of the B.C. Emergency Alerting System take place in order to notify regional residents when the provincial highway system is out of service. Effective use of this resource would deter people from entering the provincial transportation system and adding more traffic to an already failing system.”
Local snow response
The Record checked in with Lisa LeBlanc, the city’s director of the engineering, to see what discussions have been happening locally regarding Nov. 29 snow event.
“We, at a staff level in various areas, have networks that we are connected with and that we're connected to the province through,” she said. “So beginning first, with our operational teams, they connect with other operations teams around the region and they also have a direct connection to some ministry officials on the operation side and to the contractor that delivers service on behalf of the ministry. So that's quite well established.”
LeBlanc said Gabe Beliveau, the city’s manager of engineering operations, is really good about encouraging an improved response when things don't go well. She said the city’s transportation manager (Mike Anderson) is also connected to a network of transportation managers and directors from around the region.
“He has had discussions with his colleagues from around the region through the Regional Transportation Advisory Committee, which is convened by TransLink,” she noted.
Because the City of New Westminster activated its emergency operations centre on Nov. 29, LeBlanc said the city’s emergency management staff have also been having conversations with their counterparts around the region about readiness, the impacts of snow events and different responses to snow events. As the city’s engineering director, LeBlanc said she’s been in contact with officials in the south coast region of the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure.
“They were very open to hearing our feedback, particularly on the Nov. 29/30 event. We had a really good debrief, and I know that other municipalities, city engineers from other municipalities have had similar conversations,” she said. “I've had similar conversations with my colleagues as well.”
LeBlanc said city staff “felt heard by the province” in regards to their feedback related to the Nov. 29 event. She said the region fared better in the snow and ice event that occurred before Christmas.
“We did see a much improved response with respect to the last event from the provincial level,” she told the Record. “So, you know, we do we're feeling better, because at least we didn't see a repeat of the Nov. 29 experience in December. We do feel like there was a different type of attention paid.”
Province responds
The Record reached out to the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure for comment about the call for a snow summit. Here is the ministry’s statement:
The Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure reviewed the Lower Mainland maintenance contractors’ response to the Nov. 29 snow event, and has worked with the contractors to improve how plow and tow trucks will be deployed in future similar events. Ministry staff have also reached out to their counterparts in Lower Mainland municipalities to discuss winter weather response, strengthen communication lines, and share information on our level of preparedness based on available weather forecasts.
The ministry continuously monitors the performance of its contractors to ensure the high standards set out in the maintenance agreements are met, and does debrief with its contractors following major events. As each weather event can be unique, we will also continue to work closely with local governments on assessing, preparing, and communicating for each event as it occurs.
We recently introduced higher standards for maintenance contractors, requiring a more proactive approach to winter maintenance, such as returning Class A highways to bare pavement within 24 hours of a winter weather event ending (previously 48 hours) at temperatures of warmer than -9 C, increasing patrol frequencies in anticipation of a weather event, and requiring the use of remote weather information systems to forecast when a weather event will occur and to spread anti-icing chemicals beforehand.
This fiscal year, the province is investing $459 million into its contracted highway maintenance services.
British Columbia has thousands of kilometres of highways, often in challenging geography such as high mountain passes. As in the past, during extreme weather events it may be necessary to close highways on short notice to protect public safety while crews do their work. Closures are generally based on the weather forecast, observed road conditions, information from weather stations on highways, the capacity of crews to keep up with rapidly accumulating snow or rain, and the anticipated conditions on a particular highway – particularly if those conditions are expected to change quickly. The ministry regularly issues travel advisories urging people to use extreme caution during storms and keeps the public informed about any closures.
During snowy weather, drivers are encouraged to plan ahead and check DriveBC, to stay off the road should conditions worsen, and to ensure their vehicle is properly equipped with snow tires should they have to travel. Drivers can also assist maintenance crews by moving over safely when they see a vehicle with an amber light approaching. This allows maintenance crews to clear the snow and improve road conditions to reduce hazards for drivers and help them get home safely.
Kudos to staff
At Monday’s meeting, none of the council members opposing the call for a snow summit spoke about the motion, but, later in the meeting, the mayor acknowledged the efforts of city staff in responding to recent snow and ice events. He thanked engineering operations crews for “burning buckets of midnight oil” in getting prepared and responding to snow events over the holidays and gave them kudos for their response to recent snowfalls.
“We know that they can never really predict exactly what kind of snow events happen,” he said. “But every snow happens differently – snow on ice is different than rain on snow, and the response is very different. But I'm really glad to see that ... the plan was effective at hitting our priority target response times ahead of schedule.”
Johnstone said he received some complaints from the public about the city’s snow response, as he often does, but he also received a lot of kudos from people who said New Westminster’s snow response was better than some of the neighbouring communities.
“Every year, staff reviews, the snow response plan, looks at what went well, looks at what we can do better. We will be doing that again; staff will be doing that review again on it and council will have an opportunity to have a discussion about snow and ice response plans in a future meeting,” he said. “I will continue to advocate that we need to do a better job at addressing our priorities, which is pedestrian safety and accessibility in the city. I think it's still a work in progress in the city and something we need to continue to put talk about applying resources to and talk about talking about how our plans would have to be adopted to bring our pedestrian safety and our pedestrian response to the point where our road response is.”
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