Just two weeks into winter, there is a lot of snow on the ground.
Overnight, 17 centimetres fell in some areas and that means a lot of people spent the day out shoveling and scraping the snow away. Other areas saw a little less.
In Barrie, the public works yard will be empty later tonight because all of the plows will be out clearing the roads.
Clearing snow is fast becoming a winter chore that’s getting old. While watching his neighbours using snow blowers around him, Chris Kostyc quickly learned machine power is best.
“I'm not liking it so much. It's deep,” he says adding he’s “definitely getting a snow blower for next year.”
In Orillia, it’s the same: snow banks are piled high on city streets and people are fed up with digging out.
“It's just been steady coming down,” says Toby Smith, and Natalie Coles adds, “It's hard to shovel this long driveway everyday – like two hours. It takes a lot out of you.”
City crews across our region have been working since last night removing the snow but the slick and slushy roads were a challenge for one plow that went off the road in Barrie. And there is a lot more snow on its way.
“This is sort of the pre-snow,” says Environment Canada’s David Phillips of today’s weather.
The senior climatologist says we should expect a lot more snow to fall, and bring with them bone chilling temperatures starting tonight and continuing throughout the week.
“A lot of cold dangerous wind chills,” he says. “We're going to see a lot of snow squalls both Monday and Tuesday … a lot of blowing drifting snow, poor visibility. It's a lexicon of everything you could curse about this weather.”
Up to 20 centimeters could fall both Monday and Tuesday but not everyone is cursing this latest blast of winter.
“It's white gold,” says Tom Pritchard at Perfect 10 Maintenance.
By the noon hour he had already spent 12 hours plowing commercial properties and with more snow on the way he doesn't mind the extra work.
“Doing them over and over again,” he says. “It's not looking to stop over the next 24 hours so lots of coffee.”
Terence Poplak wants to make sure he makes it to work tomorrow, so today he topped up fuel for both the snow blower and the car.
“If you don't have any fuel you might not make it the gas station,” he says, “let alone getting out of the driveway. I just want to be prepared.”
City of Barrie plow crews are getting a break this evening, but will be back out at midnight to get roads and sidewalks cleared.
