**CITY OF TIMMINS NEWS RELEASE**

According to the Mattagami Region Conservation Authority’s 10-year snow depth analysis, Timmins has not seen this much snow on the ground since April 2008 and March 2009, with a current snow depth of approximately 34 inches.

This amount of snow has called for some changes to be made to snow clearing operations, and once again, we are requesting a level of patience and understanding from residents.

“We have had to make the decision to change our snow removal operations to deal with all of the snow,” explained Public Works Manager Ken Krcel. “We found our regular snow removal process was taking three times as long to clear the streets, due to the shear amount of snow. We are switching to just making passes with the blowers and not using graders and sidewalk plows to clean up loose snow or shave down build up on streets. The regular table top finish that everyone is used to will not be happening at this time as we have too many streets that are restricted, and we just need to make room for more snow.”

Krcel explained that when (or if) the snow lets up, crews will return to regular process. Exceptions will be made in the downtown areas of the Timmins BIA and South Porcupine in order to clear the banks for patrons.

“We are doing our best to catch up and widen up all of our streets, however, with the amount of snow so far in February we are running into challenges that are pushing our equipment, employees and contractors to the limit,” explained Krcel.

Since December 1, 2018, to date, the City has removed 16,111 loads of snow from our streets, compared to last year’s complete season total of 16,215. Crews have already moved close to 2,000 loads more than last year at this time.

Filed under: Local News