But city has money in reserve

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If the rest of the winter keeps pace with the near-record levels of snowfall of the past week, the city will likely spend its whole winter maintenance budget of $65 million this year, according to Toronto’s top transportation official.

“If these types of weather conditions continue, we will probably be overspent by the end of the year,” Toronto’s Transportation Services Director Gary Welsh told the city’s public works and infrastructure committee on Friday, Feb. 8.

The over-expenditure won’t be a problem, Welsh said – the city has an $11-million reserve fund for just this eventuality – but he made it clear that the city’s resources for dealing with heavy snowfalls are being stretched.

“This week has been a trying week,” he said.

“We’ve had over 50 centimetres of snow. Normally we only get 27 centimetres of snow in February. The latest snowfall was 31 centimetres and that’s the highest level we’ve had in a day since 1999 (when former mayor Mel Lastman called in the Canadian Armed Forces to help dig Toronto out). Operations this week went off as planned, but with the high amount of snow it was a very large challenge in front of us. Public expectations are very high for the city to do a good job for snow clearing.”

Welsh said the snow clearing has been a little slower than usual, with some side streets still covered in snow.

And the city will be working on snow removal on snowdrift-clogged streets through the weekend.

The storm last weekend cost about $4 million and the two storms Wednesday – which together dropped 31.5 centimetres snow – have so far cost about $2 million. The snow removal operation for Wednesday’s storms will likely cost another $2 million.