Winter Walking and Cycling

[MidTowner]

https://www.waterloochronicle.ca/news-st...-waterloo/

"If you have a neighbourhood issue, where do you go? City or to your neighbour? According to the City of Waterloo, more and more are relying on the municipality."

This byline is the worst, but the article perpetuates a fundamental failure to understand the problems with sidewalk clearing.

I have called in literally thousands of uncleared sidewalk complaints.  Not one has ever been for a neighbour.  I am happy to clear my neighbours walk the odd time.

However, I am unable to clear the hundreds of uncleared sidewalks I walk on, on my way to my destination.  How do I have a conversation with that person, who isn't my neighbour, who I don't know, and only intend to spend a few seconds in front of their house, and who in many cases lives in a different country.

I wish they would perpetuating this falsehood that sidewalks are only about the one in front of your house.

This is really well-said. I'm not sure Shayne Turner has thought things through: he's suggesting, as an official of the City, that residents take it upon themselves to confront property owners to inform them that they need to clear their sidewalks? I've happened to do this in the past, when for instance I see someone clearing off their car to go out in the morning, leaving their sidewalk uncleared. Often it's been fine ("you're right, sorry, I will get to it"), but I've also been sworn at and so on.

I don't report on my neighbours, either, and particularly wouldn't if I actually knew them. I just do it for them, and when it comes up I have a conversation about what a challenge my kids and I find uncleared sidewalks. I can't do this for everyone, either.

What if, rather than us just being increasingly whiny and "reliant on the City to solve our issues," as Shayne Turner says, the increase in complaints is because people are walking more? The City of Waterloo spends resources on an active transportation committee which, among other things, seeks to increase awareness of the positive aspects of walking, and reduce dependence on cars. What is that committee were achieving some success, and people were going out to walk, only to then find that the sidewalks are impassable?

[the_councillor]

Walking this morning, it's pretty obvious that the City of Kitchener's tweaking to its enforcement of clear sidewalks has not worked. Not because most sidewalks are impassable- most are clear, as of Sunday, even after a significant snowfall. But the few that are not are the same ones that were not earlier this season (and never were, but rather left to the weather to address), and the same ones as last winter and the winter before.

To be clear... the move to proactive enforcement was applied to a small area in 2018 and did work according to staff's report.  Council decided to go with sidewalk snow-clearing pilot before making any final decisions.

[danbrotherston]

Walking this morning, it's pretty obvious that the City of Kitchener's tweaking to its enforcement of clear sidewalks has not worked. Not because most sidewalks are impassable- most are clear, as of Sunday, even after a significant snowfall. But the few that are not are the same ones that were not earlier this season (and never were, but rather left to the weather to address), and the same ones as last winter and the winter before.

To be clear... the move to proactive enforcement was applied to a small area in 2018 and did work according to staff's report.  Council decided to go with sidewalk snow-clearing pilot before making any final decisions.

First, the criteria which they said "it worked" was dubious at best.  It wasn't "the sidewalks were entirely clear", as is the ONLY relevant criteria.

Second, it was successful, except that people complained so much about being forced to maintain their sidewalks that staff stopped enforcing the cleared standard half way through, as reported by multiple independent sources, but not included in the staff report.

So, it wasn't successful in achieving clear sidewalks, but it was successful in achieving an uproar against clearing sidewalks.

As an addendum, it wasn't applied to "a small part" of the city, as you'll recall, as you voted on it (and for it I think), council required staff to implement full city enforcement...because certain councillors felt this was the right policy and didn't want to pilot it in a small area.

Of course, since enforcement of the entire city would be prohibitively expensive, only a small area was actually patrolled, which means there is actually no way to see how effective it was...but one thing is certain, if you actually want to patrol the whole city, costs are going to be far higher.

I sure wish you were aware of this.

Just an FYI: My new years resolution is to not mince words, your policies are broken and people are suffering. Stop pretending otherwise.

[the_councillor]

More than likely, it's just not well thought-out. That person drives on the roads, so of course they need to be cleared. He doesn't walk on the sidewalks, so of course using salt on them is a waste.

I'm not bothering with calling the city too much this season, honestly, but I personally loaded up on salt a few months' back and am dumping it liberally on my kids' route to school where I know that property owners will not clear. I've cleared a few windrows that I know never otherwise will be, but I'm not usually the one walking them to school and not usually able to take my shovel with me.

I've always tried to use salt pretty judiciously on my own sidewalk, and usually find that it's only infrequently. But I figure if I do wind up dumping 150 kilos of salt on other people's sidewalks this season, it's not even a rounding error compared to the thousands of tonnes the City uses making sure the roads are clear and dry.

Please write your councillors, they need to hear this again and again.

Some of those "insincere" people (and I do agree that is the right word, if they've deluded themselves into believing a lie to justify their belief, that's still on them) are sitting on Kitchener City Council.

That's not what insincere actually means... I'd say the feelings expressed by those on city-council are pretty genuine.  To recap:

1. City sidewalk snow clearing policies in the best of cities that do this work means people are still trapped in their homes for at least two days if the snow is light... and much longer in heavy snowfalls.  And this is just the policy... I encourage you to google the reality.  I believe, while never perfect, proactive enforcement will be better.

2. It is very expensive.  Using Ottawa as the model, the gold-standard in Canada of sidewalk-clearing (and a city that's been over-budget on snow clearing for 7 straight years) would indicate at least a 5% tax increase on top of a required inflationary increase for this level of service:

          https://ottawasun.com/opinion/letters/ed...-sidewalks

3. No city that does the clearing themselves has a bare-pavement standard.  Let me repeat that... no city that clears their sidewalks gets down to a point that's considered accessible by our own accessibility advisory committee.  They all have a packed-snow standard because they know it's not possible if the city does it.  I don't believe bare pavement is a reasonable standard either depending on weather events, but my point is, using accessibility as an argument for city-clearing is entirely fictitious. 

Say what you will about my sincerity but my genuine belief after significant research is that there are several other more important areas to spend our very limited resources on (e.g. climate change, affordable housing, etc.) than one that no other city has been able to achieve an effective level of service.

[danbrotherston]

Please write your councillors, they need to hear this again and again.

Some of those "insincere" people (and I do agree that is the right word, if they've deluded themselves into believing a lie to justify their belief, that's still on them) are sitting on Kitchener City Council.

That's not what insincere actually means... I'd say the feelings expressed by those on city-council are pretty genuine.  To recap:

1. City sidewalk snow clearing policies in the best of cities that do this work means people are still trapped in their homes for at least two days if the snow is light... and much longer in heavy snowfalls.  And this is just the policy... I encourage you to google the reality.  I believe, while never perfect, proactive enforcement will be better.

2. It is very expensive.  Using Ottawa as the model, the gold-standard in Canada of sidewalk-clearing (and a city that's been over-budget on snow clearing for 7 straight years) would indicate at least a 5% tax increase on top of a required inflationary increase for this level of service:

          https://ottawasun.com/opinion/letters/ed...-sidewalks

3. No city that does the clearing themselves has a bare-pavement standard.  Let me repeat that... no city that clears their sidewalks gets down to a point that's considered accessible by our own accessibility advisory committee.  They all have a packed-snow standard because they know it's not possible if the city does it.  I don't believe bare pavement is a reasonable standard either depending on weather events, but my point is, using accessibility as an argument for city-clearing is entirely fictitious. 

Say what you will about my sincerity but my genuine belief after significant research is that there are several other more important areas to spend our very limited resources on (e.g. climate change, affordable housing, etc.) than one that no other city has been able to achieve an effective level of service.

I don't need you to provide me with a dictionary, the point is, one reason you object to sidewalk clearing is use of salt and our environment.  But clearing the sidewalks, and not the roads would be the clear winning environmental policy, and we spend I don't know 5x the salt on roads....that's what was being argued is insincere.  You do so again here, when you pretend that ensuring sidewalks clear is a priority that must be balanced with climate change...forcing people to drive in the winter, is a policy which is bad for climate.

On to your claims here. Even if your claim is true that people are trapped in their homes for at least 2 days after a major blizzard, which I don't agree with, it would still beat our city, where people are trapped in their homes for 3 to 4 MONTHS!

This is what makes me so frustrated, is you won't admit the current system is completely broken, and incredibly harmful to people in our community.

As for the cost, please don't pretend that a city, which sees an average of 5 degrees colder in the winter than here is a comparable city for sidewalk clearing cost. As for clearing to pavement, every sidewalk I have seen, as cleared by the city, is cleared to pavement, including the pilot area, and DTK (which I pay for). Yes, the plows do not scrape to bare pavement, they don't on roads either, in both cases, a judicious amount of salt is used to achieve bare pavement over time. I don't know why I have to explain to you.

[danbrotherston]

@the_councillor

Here is an honest question for you, and an honest offer.

Have you actually gone out and walked around our community (not your neighbourhood) with any accessibility (or even active transportation) advocates? Have you walked the pilot area, and compared it with other areas.

I hope the extent to your "research" is more than just reading letters to the editor in the Sun newspaper, because that isn't a source.

If you have not, I urge you to, I will go out with you, I'm sure others in the community would be willing too as well. You can see how well city clearing works, and where it is weak, you can see the problems with the current situation. There are plenty willing. Are you?

[the_councillor]

To be clear... the move to proactive enforcement was applied to a small area in 2018 and did work according to staff's report.  Council decided to go with sidewalk snow-clearing pilot before making any final decisions.

First, the criteria which they said "it worked" was dubious at best.  It wasn't "the sidewalks were entirely clear", as is the ONLY relevant criteria.

Second, it was successful, except that people complained so much about being forced to maintain their sidewalks that staff stopped enforcing the cleared standard half way through, as reported by multiple independent sources, but not included in the staff report.

So, it wasn't successful in achieving clear sidewalks, but it was successful in achieving an uproar against clearing sidewalks.

As an addendum, it wasn't applied to "a small part" of the city, as you'll recall, as you voted on it (and for it I think), council required staff to implement full city enforcement...because certain councillors felt this was the right policy and didn't want to pilot it in a small area.

Of course, since enforcement of the entire city would be prohibitively expensive, only a small area was actually patrolled, which means there is actually no way to see how effective it was...but one thing is certain, if you actually want to patrol the whole city, costs are going to be far higher.

I sure wish you were aware of this.

Just an FYI: My new years resolution is to not mince words, your policies are broken and people are suffering.  Stop pretending otherwise.

Wait, what?  Who's pretending existing policies are working?  No one thinks the situation is fine... don't know where you're getting that from.  I also don't know who your "multiple independent sources" are.  I can only speak for myself, but yes, proactive enforcement did create an uproar, entirely as expected, from people that weren't clearing the sidewalks.  And I could care less.  If you're fortunate enough to own a property with a sidewalk in this city... then clear it to a reasonable standard or get fined until you do.  That was exactly the point and exactly why it worked.  And it was a small area, costing just 0.15% on the tax levy, it was planned to roll over the city in time.  Regardless, we could absolutely do the whole city each year (which is inefficient) at a tiny fraction of the cost of Ottawa-standard snow-clearing.

As an aside; suppose the city did this work... you realize who we'd be subsidizing right?  All of those living in apartments, condos, multiplexes etc... i.e. all the lower-cost homes out there without a sidewalk would end up paying higher property taxes (or via rent) to subsidize the snow-removal of those that are fortunate enough to have a sidewalk in front of their home.  I'd much rather subsidize people that can't afford any home.  Those are the people that are really suffering.

[danbrotherston]

First, the criteria which they said "it worked" was dubious at best.  It wasn't "the sidewalks were entirely clear", as is the ONLY relevant criteria.

Second, it was successful, except that people complained so much about being forced to maintain their sidewalks that staff stopped enforcing the cleared standard half way through, as reported by multiple independent sources, but not included in the staff report.

So, it wasn't successful in achieving clear sidewalks, but it was successful in achieving an uproar against clearing sidewalks.

As an addendum, it wasn't applied to "a small part" of the city, as you'll recall, as you voted on it (and for it I think), council required staff to implement full city enforcement...because certain councillors felt this was the right policy and didn't want to pilot it in a small area.

Of course, since enforcement of the entire city would be prohibitively expensive, only a small area was actually patrolled, which means there is actually no way to see how effective it was...but one thing is certain, if you actually want to patrol the whole city, costs are going to be far higher.

I sure wish you were aware of this.

Just an FYI: My new years resolution is to not mince words, your policies are broken and people are suffering.  Stop pretending otherwise.

Wait, what?  Who's pretending existing policies are working?  No one thinks the situation is fine... don't know where you're getting that from.  I also don't know who your "multiple independent sources" are.  I can only speak for myself, but yes, proactive enforcement did create an uproar, entirely as expected, from people that weren't clearing the sidewalks.  And I could care less.  If you're fortunate enough to own a property with a sidewalk in this city... then clear it to a reasonable standard or get fined until you do.  That was exactly the point and exactly why it worked.  And it was a small area, costing just 0.15% on the tax levy, it was planned to roll over the city in time.  Regardless, we could absolutely do the whole city each year (which is inefficient) at a tiny fraction of the cost of Ottawa-standard snow-clearing.

As an aside; suppose the city did this work... you realize who we'd be subsidizing right?  All of those living in apartments, condos, multiplexes etc... i.e. all the lower-cost homes out there without a sidewalk would end up paying higher property taxes (or via rent) to subsidize the snow-removal of those that are fortunate enough to have a sidewalk in front of their home.  I'd much rather subsidize people that can't afford any home.  Those are the people that are really suffering.

Subsidies, no, actually, as usual, people who live in multi-unit buildings are subsidizing single homeowners. Everyone in my building, all 60 households would pay the same tax every year, as a single house, that means we're paying roughly 30-40 times (we have slightly more sidewalk than a house) as much to clear the same sidewalk.

Clearing your sidewalk isn't free, unless your labor is free, and if your labor is free, I have a bunch of jobs which need doing.

But you're missing the point, do you think that homeowners pay taxes to clear the roads, so their road in front of their home is cleared?  NO! This is the whole point! We pay to clear roads so that we can get places. No matter where you live in the city, you will benefit from sidewalk clearing because you will have clear sidewalks to walk on. Why is this so hard for you to understand? I don't give one fuck what some homeowner gets, I care whether I can safely walk past their house.

As for who is pretending current policies are working, YOU ARE. You said that the cities pilot worked, I can tell you, it didn't...and it was rolled out to the whole city, right away, as requested by council.

And I'm glad you aren't afraid of residents freaking out about getting fined, but I'll point out again, staff, bylaw enforcement, stopped enforcing clear sidewalk standards, multiple people independently reported that bylaw told them that a sidewalk which was not clear of snow was clear enough, and that bylaw was not enforcing the "clear pavement" standard any longer, and was instead only enforcing "the homeowner made a best effort" standard. So clearly, someone didn't have so much gumption to continue offending homeowners as you do.

[ijmorlan]

2. It is very expensive.  Using Ottawa as the model, the gold-standard in Canada of sidewalk-clearing (and a city that's been over-budget on snow clearing for 7 straight years) would indicate at least a 5% tax increase on top of a required inflationary increase for this level of service:

Not as expensive as having everybody shovel their own. Unless the city is full of unemployed people, their time is worth something; several hours worth of time every year is worth more than any estimate I’ve ever heard of the cost of City clearing. If people had a choice between clearing their own sidewalks and paying $40 a year or something, how many people do you think would keep shovelling their own? Note, that just not shovelling it and taking an infinitesimal chance of being ticketed isn’t what I’m talking about — I’m talking about actually shovelling it.

Also it is obviously way cheaper to clear sidewalks than roads; but nobody raises the idea of only clearing some lanes of the road in order to leave room in the budget for sidewalks.

What is so hard about understanding this basic logic? Until you explain, in detail and with specificity, what is wrong with the above line of thinking, you’ll have to pardon me for doubting your sincerity in claiming you have actually considered this issue.

[ijmorlan]

3. No city that does the clearing themselves has a bare-pavement standard.  Let me repeat that... no city that clears their sidewalks gets down to a point that's considered accessible by our own accessibility advisory committee.  They all have a packed-snow standard because they know it's not possible if the city does it.  I don't believe bare pavement is a reasonable standard either depending on weather events, but my point is, using accessibility as an argument for city-clearing is entirely fictitious. 

Just noticed this too.

I don’t know what the City of Waterloo’s official standard is for sidewalks that they clear, but I know that as a practical matter the sidewalks near me that are cleared by the city are down to the pavement most of the time. So all they need to do is run the same sidewalk plows on every sidewalk instead of just some sidewalks, and we will definitely have much better results than we do now, and at less cumulative cost over the entire population.

I’d appreciate if you would do us all the courtesy of discontinuing claiming that bare pavement is not done when it plainly is.

Also as I mentioned, I think just up-thread, the existence of some sidewalks already cleared by the city proves that it can work, and it does work better than each property clearing their own — there is no prediction or theory to be tested, just a straightforward observation of what is already happening. The question is, do I believe your words or my lying eyes?

[the_councillor]

3. No city that does the clearing themselves has a bare-pavement standard.  Let me repeat that... no city that clears their sidewalks gets down to a point that's considered accessible by our own accessibility advisory committee.  They all have a packed-snow standard because they know it's not possible if the city does it.  I don't believe bare pavement is a reasonable standard either depending on weather events, but my point is, using accessibility as an argument for city-clearing is entirely fictitious. 

Just noticed this too.

I don’t know what the City of Waterloo’s official standard is for sidewalks that they clear, but I know that as a practical matter the sidewalks near me that are cleared by the city are down to the pavement most of the time. So all they need to do is run the same sidewalk plows on every sidewalk instead of just some sidewalks, and we will definitely have much better results than we do now, and at less cumulative cost over the entire population.

I’d appreciate if you would do us all the courtesy of discontinuing claiming that bare pavement is not done when it plainly is.

Also as I mentioned, I think just up-thread, the existence of some sidewalks already cleared by the city proves that it can work, and it does work better than each property clearing their own — there is no prediction or theory to be tested, just a straightforward observation of what is already happening. The question is, do I believe your words or my lying eyes?

You see, this is exactly what worries me; the expectation of service-level.  Yes, DT Waterloo and DT Kitchener etc. have a fantastic level of service.  And we can absolutely replicate that 'usually down to the pavement' city-wide... but that's an extremely costly level of service.  Far greater than even the ~5% tax increase of Ottawa-class service.  I'll confirm more precisely with staff when this comes back (because I understand you may not trust my words) but suffice-it-to-say we're talking an order of magnitude more expensive/km than anyone else that does this.

The belief is that people will wake in the morning after a snowfall and see spotless sidewalks like the downtown.  The reality is it will be two days later... and even then, will leave an inch of snow that might not be traversable by a stroller or wheelchair.

[danbrotherston]

Just noticed this too.

I don’t know what the City of Waterloo’s official standard is for sidewalks that they clear, but I know that as a practical matter the sidewalks near me that are cleared by the city are down to the pavement most of the time. So all they need to do is run the same sidewalk plows on every sidewalk instead of just some sidewalks, and we will definitely have much better results than we do now, and at less cumulative cost over the entire population.

I’d appreciate if you would do us all the courtesy of discontinuing claiming that bare pavement is not done when it plainly is.

Also as I mentioned, I think just up-thread, the existence of some sidewalks already cleared by the city proves that it can work, and it does work better than each property clearing their own — there is no prediction or theory to be tested, just a straightforward observation of what is already happening. The question is, do I believe your words or my lying eyes?

You see, this is exactly what worries me; the expectation of service-level.  Yes, DT Waterloo and DT Kitchener etc. have a fantastic level of service.  And we can absolutely replicate that 'usually down to the pavement' city-wide... but that's an extremely costly level of service.  Far greater than even the ~5% tax increase of Ottawa-class service.  I'll confirm more precisely with staff when this comes back (because I understand you may not trust my words) but suffice-it-to-say we're talking an order of magnitude more expensive/km than anyone else that does this.

The belief is that people will wake in the morning after a snowfall and see spotless sidewalks like the downtown.  The reality is it will be two days later... and even then, will leave an inch of snow that might not be traversable by a stroller or wheelchair.

You are confusing two things here, speed of clearing, and quality of clearing. The city is already achieving bare pavement quality of sidewalk clearing on sidewalks across the city, including in the pilot zone. Nobody is expecting every sidewalk in the city to be cleared instantly. I don't know why you are confusing these things but they are different.  You are making a false argument by contriving the two. To suggest that city sidewalk clearing cannot achieve their pavement, in face of the fact that it already does, is the problem the ijmorlan was responding to, why you are bringing up the other issue I won't speculate about.

[the_councillor]

2. It is very expensive.  Using Ottawa as the model, the gold-standard in Canada of sidewalk-clearing (and a city that's been over-budget on snow clearing for 7 straight years) would indicate at least a 5% tax increase on top of a required inflationary increase for this level of service:

Not as expensive as having everybody shovel their own. Unless the city is full of unemployed people, their time is worth something; several hours worth of time every year is worth more than any estimate I’ve ever heard of the cost of City clearing. If people had a choice between clearing their own sidewalks and paying $40 a year or something, how many people do you think would keep shovelling their own? Note, that just not shovelling it and taking an infinitesimal chance of being ticketed isn’t what I’m talking about — I’m talking about actually shovelling it.

Also it is obviously way cheaper to clear sidewalks than roads; but nobody raises the idea of only clearing some lanes of the road in order to leave room in the budget for sidewalks.

What is so hard about understanding this basic logic? Until you explain, in detail and with specificity, what is wrong with the above line of thinking, you’ll have to pardon me for doubting your sincerity in claiming you have actually considered this issue.

Let me put the logic another way... or better yet, put you in the decision-making place where council lives.

Simplifying capital/operating expenditures for the moment to make them applicable to this situation-- the budget we just approved had somewhere around 1.5 million in funds we could use to be progressive.  We invested largely in affordable housing, climate change, cycling and improving city-tree-maintenance.  Citywide snow clearing (at the Ottawa level) would be in the range of 6 million every year (plus inflation)... my napkin-math est.  This means if we started allocating ALL disposable funds now, and did nothing else... we could roll out the service sometime in 2024. 

Four years would go by with no further advancement on climate change, no advancement on a minimum grid for cycling, no advancement in affordable housing or anything else people care about.  You doubt my sincerity of thought and consideration on this issue?  I've researched, asked questions, written articles, and I'm spending my time detailing thoughts here late on a Saturday night, months before the actual vote.  And I'm spending it with people I know are unlikely to agree, rather than most who prefer an echo-chamber of the like-minded.  I'm not sure your expectations of consideration are entirely fair.

[danbrotherston]

Not as expensive as having everybody shovel their own. Unless the city is full of unemployed people, their time is worth something; several hours worth of time every year is worth more than any estimate I’ve ever heard of the cost of City clearing. If people had a choice between clearing their own sidewalks and paying $40 a year or something, how many people do you think would keep shovelling their own? Note, that just not shovelling it and taking an infinitesimal chance of being ticketed isn’t what I’m talking about — I’m talking about actually shovelling it.

Also it is obviously way cheaper to clear sidewalks than roads; but nobody raises the idea of only clearing some lanes of the road in order to leave room in the budget for sidewalks.

What is so hard about understanding this basic logic? Until you explain, in detail and with specificity, what is wrong with the above line of thinking, you’ll have to pardon me for doubting your sincerity in claiming you have actually considered this issue.

Let me put the logic another way... or better yet, put you in the decision-making place where council lives.

Simplifying capital/operating expenditures for the moment to make them applicable to this situation-- the budget we just approved had somewhere around 1.5 million in funds we could use to be progressive.  We invested largely in affordable housing, climate change, cycling and improving city-tree-maintenance.  Citywide snow clearing (at the Ottawa level) would be in the range of 6 million every year (plus inflation)... my napkin-math est.  This means if we started allocating ALL disposable funds now, and did nothing else... we could roll out the service sometime in 2024. 

Four years would go by with no further advancement on climate change, no advancement on a minimum grid for cycling, no advancement in affordable housing or anything else people care about.  You doubt my sincerity of thought and consideration on this issue?  I've researched, asked questions, written articles, and I'm spending my time detailing thoughts here late on a Saturday night, months before the actual vote.  And I'm spending it with people I know are unlikely to agree, rather than most who prefer an echo-chamber of the like-minded.  I'm not sure your expectations of consideration are entirely fair.

If cost is your real objection, then I'm happy to have that discussion, because that's an honest one to have.

First, I'd argue that we should have a tax increase to pay for it, unlike less visible things like inflation and tree pruning, I think the average resident would at least understand the increase clearly, "yes, I pay x more per year, but now I see sidewalk plows"...this worked for the DTK zone (snow clearing is on my taxes, and I'm happy about it), now I realize not everyone agrees, but at least we can have that discussion.  And keep in mind, our taxes were basically flat this year.Like I said, the ta I realize a lot of people aren't because of the aformentioned inability to understand inflation, but those who do look closely are happy. In fact, so happy, I think we should have actually increased the budget in line with other jurisdictions (CoW and RoW had much greater increases, with less investment) in order to fund, say, increased clearing--this was the year to do it, when the increase was already low. In fact, so happy, I think we should have actually increased the budget in line with other jurisdictions (CoW and RoW had much greater increases, with less investment) in order to fund, say, increased clearing--this was the year to do it, when the increase was already low.

Next, sure, lets minimize that increase, lets cut back from the roads budget--do cul-de-sacs and cresents only at the provincial minimum standards--people already routinely claim that the city does not ever plow them, so why bother, if people don't believe you do it anyway, stop clearing leaves from the side of roads--it's a hazard for cyclists anyway, making a priority clearing network this year, and consider adding more services in future years, etc.

But at the end of the day, this is a more honest discussion than we're having, where you're arguing it's a bad idea because of the environment, which is frustrating at best, or it's a bad idea because we can do just fine with property owner clearing is better, which is so clearly not working, or that increased bylaw enforcement works, which again, isn't borne out by the experience walking around our city...etc. This is an honest discussion.

[jamincan]

It is clear to me that we could manage to clear sidewalks and bike lanes/trails if we chose to. We manage to do it for roads; there is not anything fundamentally different about sidewalks, trails and bike lanes that make them impossible to clear. Furthermore, there are many examples of northern cities in much snowier climates than ours that haven't chosen to abandon active transportation in the winter and where cycling and walking thrive year-round. The status quo isn't inevitable; we can do better; our city council chooses not to.

Kitchener declared a climate emergency last year. I therefore expect a clear road map from the city on how we will reduce greenhouse gas emissions here. Surely, reducing car dependence in winter is a key element of that. Right now, we massively subsidize car transportation by plowing roads to everyone's driveways. I'm not saying we should stop this, but by not providing better snow clearing for active transportation, we are creating an incentive to drive over walking, riding, or taking transit. This is basic economics and contrary to what I'd expect from a city actively trying to fight climate change.

I think last year clearly showed proactive enforcement was a complete failure at keeping sidewalks passable. You don't need a staff report to understand this, as simply trying to walk on many of the sidewalks that were supposedly covered by the policy clearly showed that they were not passable and never were at any point in the enforcement period.  Let's call a spade a spade - proactive enforcement is a way to cheaply pretend that we're doing something about a problem while continuing on with the status quo.

Sadly, I think you'll probably end up finding the status quo works. In 10 years, we'll probably have pushed solving the problem off long enough that it won't be a problem any more thanks to climate change.