Sidewalk Snow-Clearing Requirement To Be Discussed Tonight
The ordinance would require residents to clear their sidewalks.
FILE PHOTO: Should Waltham impose an ordinance to require residents to clear their sidewalks?
Adam Knee
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The proposed ordinance that would require residents to clear snow and ice from their sidewalks will be discussed tonight, March 4 at the City Council’s meeting.
City Councillor Gary Marchese proposed the idea recently after hearing of residents’ concerns of sidewalks not cleared during the recent blizzard.
The issue will be discussed at the City Council’s Committee of the Whole Meeting at 8 p.m. at City Hall.
Currently, the city requires property owners on Main Street to clear their sidewalks within 24 hours of the last snowfall. That regulation applies to both sides of the street from Prospect Hill Road to Linden Street.
Wake Up
6:13 am on Monday, March 4, 2013
Pedestrians are still forced to walk in the street to get around piles of impassable snow and ice. Obviously this poses a danger to pedestrians and also slows traffic on narrow streets. The homeowners should have to clear their walks just as businesses do. It's an opportunity for a great deal of revenue!
WalthamResident
8:15 pm on Monday, March 4, 2013
I live at the corner of an intersection. By my estimate, the city plowed almost 800 cubic feet of hard-packed snow and ice weighing over 15,000 lbs onto the sidewalks in front of my house. (Being on a corner there is a huge amount of sidewalk vs. my tiny yard.) That's the weight of 5 cars to shovel. I pay a licensed, bonded company to keep my sidewalks clear and they quit when they saw it.
It took me quite awhile to get that even remotely clear myself. But unless *you* can lift five cars, please dial back the rhetoric about what a lazy awful neighbor I am for not having my sidewalks clear the next day.
On top of that, the hypocrisy of the city plowing that much snow onto a sidewalk using dump trucks and then fining the resident for not shoveling it is on a whole other level.
phil felton
10:11 am on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
I also live on a corner lot and the snow pushed up aproxly 7 feet. I have a 11/24 snow blower and it would not clear a path. Why can't the snow be plowed down the street so the corner would not that much snow. Forget walking the cars can not see around the corner.........