Fancy that. It's amazing what happens when someone realizes their elected office is on the line.
UPDATE: for perspective, note just a sampling of the left-of-center outrage (not exactly a small demographic in Seattle) at the City's performance in December.
And Joel Connelly for one, two, three, yes, even four columns.
That's a grumpy city Mayor Nickels has to find new ways to impress.
Sounds like even the libs want a scapegoat. Wonder who it will be this time. Some poor schmoe following orders?
Posted by: swatter on January 5, 2009 07:46 AMMany here are whining about Nickels not using salt. Now, he'll salt everything. And shortly, when cars start to rot, many of those same people will blame Nickels.
In this instance, he can't win... which is not altogether a bad thing.
Posted by: Hinton on January 5, 2009 08:08 AMWell, the sidestreets are nearly impassable. Sidewalks are in many places non-existant. The main flat roads are driveable and they certainly use salt. If you live in a residential area you just can't get out.
I grant you that this is the worst snow Spokane has seen in years. However this myth that other cities just "handle it" is complete nonsense.
And we don't even want to talk about trying to get a cab there!
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on January 5, 2009 12:02 PMI never made a claim that you do. You claim someone's a fool if they expect something in return for their tax dollars, like clearing roads after a snowstorm. I claim anyone who doesn't expect something in return is a bigger fool. There's nothing redeeming (if you prefer that word) about "toughing it out" on dangerous roads because an inept government doesn't do what's necessary to make them safe.
Posted by: Palouse on January 5, 2009 01:02 PMIt is definitely the sheer volume of snow here - in a short amount of time, with very little melting - that is our problem.
Posted by: Scott B on January 5, 2009 01:13 PMAs for Seattle most of the main roads were also passable during the last snow, but people were whining because they couldn't get out of the own residential streets. It's been that way as long as I can remember any time it snows, and it's like that pretty much everywhere.
My larger point is that people in Seattle are spoiled, unprepared crybabies that acted as if it were the end of the world when we got a winter snow because they expected to government to prevent any inconvenience.
The reaction to this last snow was far beyond anything I've seen in the past.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on January 5, 2009 01:14 PMIt was incredible, and I in no way mean to say that Spokane is doing a poor job.
In Seattle you always hear, "I'm from the, (midwest, east coast, eastern Washington, etc.), and we NEVER have the problems you people have here". I've heard this for years and it's in the category of "I walked to school barefoot uphill both ways" just not exactly the real story.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on January 5, 2009 01:22 PMWanna try to kick the football again, Charlie Brown?
Posted by: Huey on January 5, 2009 01:23 PMWinter-highway-maintenance expert Prof. Wilfrid Nixon of the University of Iowa College of Engineering says good, old-fashioned salt is the best ice-buster. And another thing for the environmentally conscious to consider is the impact accidents have on the environment. "Every crash in the winter is an environmental disaster," Nixon said. "You have spills of engine oil, gas, coolant. It may not be hundreds of miles of road, but the effect is intensely local."Posted by: Ragnar Danneskjold on January 5, 2009 01:38 PM
I never claimed I do this either. You're sure good at straw men.
I do, however, expect something in return for my tax dollars, like safe roads, not boondoggles that Seattle instead spends money on.
Posted by: Palouse on January 5, 2009 01:39 PMIn older neighborhoods where cars are parked on the streets, the plows can only make one pass down the middle, and sometimes it actually weaves a little to avoid parked vehicles on either side of the roads. These roads can get pretty bad...
We sent some pictures of the snow to my parents, who snow-bird in Arizona. My dad told me that "That's a lot of snow, even for a guy raised in Minnesota."
Posted by: ScottB on January 5, 2009 02:23 PMHow dumb can you get? It was a snow that rapidly was turning to rain with warming temperatures. Not much reason to break out the salt. By this morning our street was bare and wet. Seattle liberals are as amusing as they are annoying.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on January 5, 2009 02:42 PMNot amusing and not annoying, I think incompetent is more appropriate.
We will be in deep do do if we ever have a real emergency around here!
PS did you see they were resuming clean green today in Seattle, great news now you can put all your grass clippings from the past 3 weeks of mowing out at the curb. It took me a little longer to mow my yard since I had to use my snow blower first, but I managed..
Seriously it took them 4 weeks to get my recycling because last week, after 3 weeks, it was regularly scheduled clean green week.
How do you spell idiots, more choices around here than you can shake a stick at!
It's a state of being found wherever liberals congregate. Walk by Seattleites on the street and they avoid eye contact so they won't have to smile and say, "morning!" You can go to Seattle any day and perform this experiment.
It has become a very unfriendly city where people are so devoid of common courtesy that they routinely block the entire sidewalk at a bus stop forcing pedestrians to walk into the street to get around them.
Seattle is 80% liberal. They are grumpy and a perpetual state of outrage about any number of things. This week it's those mean Israelis picking on those poor innocent Palestinians.
Jamieson was very good on our leadership vacuum. And if Geov -- to the left of Pol Pot -- gets it, maybe we can get Plugged Nickels away from us.
(Repeated often during our long local nightmare were reports that side streets over in the real Nickelsville, Greg's neighborhood in West Seattle, were free and clear. And riddle me this: If Greg is utterly unmanned by salt and snow, how will he and we deal with a 7.0 on the Richter Scale? All the wake-ups we've had, and we're clueless about even rudimentary reactions to real disaster. Sux to be on the Burnin' Ring of Fire with green libs in charge.)
Posted by: wooden nickels on January 5, 2009 03:43 PMArterials were safe and bridges were open during December's snowstorms, Seattle Department of Transportation Director Grace Crunican said this morning.
She must have been sniffing too much de-icer, another reason to use salt!
Posted by: tg on January 5, 2009 04:32 PMNo one yet has been able to note which arterials were not open within 24-hours of the storm.
Yup Seattle should have used salt. Despite that you could pretty much get around with just front wheel drive unless you lived on a very steep hill.
You've got to be careful what you ask for, particularly in a city run by liberals. If we aren't careful the city will ask for a huge tax increase in order to buy a massive inventory of snow removal equipment. Like we really need that for the once every 5-year snowstorm.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on January 5, 2009 04:47 PMI think we had the best idea from good old Charlie Chong when he suggested that larger trucks be retrofitted with the ability to use a blade.
The city, county and state have a number of trucks that could be used for dual service.
But then again we never elected poor old Charlie.
Posted by: tg on January 5, 2009 04:52 PMBut Charlie made sense. No wonder he wasn't elected in this nutty city.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on January 5, 2009 05:07 PMLike you have a choice about paying taxes? What does "honor" have to do with it when you are forced to pay the taxes.
Actually, you do. I estimate my 2008 tax load to the United States of America, the State of Washington, the County of Snohomish, and the City of Edmonds to be around $1500 complete, dominated by gas/flight taxes. And this is done legally.
Where there is a will - and a creative mind - there is a way!
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on January 6, 2009 11:06 AM