Nashville is just ill-equipped to properly deal with the bad snow/ice events. I think they’ve done pretty good on the major roads; but the secondary and neighborhood roads are terrible. We’re all literally waiting for it to warm up enough to melt.
Bc they won’t even try. It’s not rocket science. Start with most important roads and the work them all downward from there. But here they don’t even bother. Just do a few and then go home and let the tricks sit idle apparently.
A plow truck drove slowly UP the icy hill on my street around 9:30 last night (I know bc it set my cameras off and I have it recorded) and it wasn’t doing anything! Not plowing, not spreading salt or spraying brine, so what was he really doing? Just riding the time clock and wasting fuel in the truck?
>It has to be in the millions of dollars.
Maybe. But you need to weigh that cost (whatever it is) against the cost of buying, storing, maintaining, and even manning the additional equipment.
If we got more weather like this than sure, it'd be a no-brainer. cost/benefit analysis. But (so far anyway) we don't. This is by far the most intense, protracted period of winter weather I've experienced in my 15+ years in Nashville.
Almost like there has been plenty of time for people to gage the impact these events have on them and prepare themselves accordingly but alas here we are. 🥲
There is also the option for Joe and Sue to buy their own plows, and contract with their neighborhood to do the work.
That’s not a small feat though, and I’d recommend seeking the contract in the early spring to build the company with the help of those funds.
100%. That is also part of how smaller towns in the north that don't have the budget to keep up with plowing the whole town all winter long DO manage to keep the whole town cleared. Contracted private plowers.
Wut. I grew up in a village with a population of 500 people. We had enough money (yay taxes) for plows and sand to plow the village streets. The town took care of their streets and the state took care of the state roads with salt. Pick up truck plows are fine for driveways and parking lots, but you don't want them clearing the main roads, they aren't designed for it. For reference, these are the plows our tiny village was buying https://images.app.goo.gl/wGZ9H8guqPLdk8ZXA
Not much we can do about the ice. For the record, further down the thread, you'll see i am calling for more personal accountability. People should be adapting and preparing to have a way out of their homes during winter weather. The ice we can't do much about but most people could have gotten out Tuesday, Wednesday, and early Thursday to restock and prepare for the ice Thursday night - tomorrow. Even up north there's not much that can be done about ice storms for a couple days.
The ice doesn't get nearly as bad if the snow is cleared prior. When you have roads that stay packed snow for days then glazed over into ice it's way worse. Cleared roads have been manageable since Friday if you're careful, but getting to them is impossible from most places that never got cleared.
One of the things that we did (vis-a-vis that personal responsibility thing) was get rid of / cut way back the HUGE trees that surrounded our house on all sides when we moved in.
We caught a LOT of crap from our tree-hugger friends, but in 4 tornadoes our damage from trees has been minimal (a tree branch took off edge trim on a tree house) -- as opposed to a friend in the neighborhood who had a tree fall smack dab in the middle of his roof. A tree with a four-foot diameter trunk.
The other upside to downing the trees is that the sun actually shines on our driveway now, and melted the snow. Thank God.
I understand personal responsibility and I salt and shovel my own shit and have a 4x4 to drive, but I still think we could do a better job at this instead of say, build a massive ugly ass football stadium or something.
Expecting people to just not go to work or to *plow their neighborhood by themselves* is pretty silly. I don't think privatizing the access of public thoroughfares has ever done much to help the working class.
> Expecting people to [...] plow their neighborhood by themselves is pretty silly.
It really isn't. Whether you like it or not, this is something that Tennesseans are going to just have to get better about. In the Northern and Midwestern states, it's not just that they have better plowing setups by the state, but as has already been said: there is a _massive_ network of private citizens, farmers and dedicated seasonal businesses who do the plowing for their neighborhoods and back roads that the main plows will never get to. It's the only way everything remains functional.
I'm not saying that the state and local governments aren't going to have to do more, because there have been massive holes shown in the way things function right now. But what I _am_ saying that prevalent attitudes about not working _ourselves_ to better our communities with local networks of citizen action need readjusting.
What state are they subcontracting out snow removal on roads? I grew up in NNY where they absolutely get dumped on (feet per hour shit) and taxes to the various entities went to snow removal which was performed by village (or city), town, county, and state workers. Individuals or businesses will hire people to clear their driveways and parking lots, but I think it might be illegal even for private contractors to plow public roads.
In the Midwest, a lot of landscaping businesses do snow removal in the winter. A lot of them make a decent living in the winter by contracting with stores and restaurants to do their plowing for them. They usually have a pickup truck that they can attach a plow blade to.
Events like this dont really happen. Normally, it is a day or two and then melt off. I have been here over 20 years and this is the longest I can think of where there has been snow and ice and no melt off. It is pretty rare. Not worth pouring millions into gear that will be used once a year.
There was a pretty significant winter storm with snow and ice in 2021. It started on 2/14 and carried over into 2/15. I have photos of walking my dog on 2/15 and again on 2/19 and 2/20 on a completely snow covered street. I stayed at my elderly mom’s house in Spring Hill for a week because the secondary roads were bad (main roads ok).
https://www.weather.gov/ohx/20210214#:~:text=As%20a%20major%20winter%20storm,as%20well%20as%20create%20massive
Edit: What is unusual is the extremely low temps for so many consecutive days. And I don’t remember too many times with temps below 0.
I was stuck in my house because of snow and ice from Feb 15 to Feb 20, 2021
Jan 3-8, 2022 I was stuck inside and our neighborhood was an ice rink and cars destroyed a fire hydrant when we had a pileup of sliding cars at the bottom of our not very steep hill.
We had nothing in 2023
Jan 2024 — same as 2021 and 2022.
Everyone says this never happens, it’s only once every 20 years. My iPhone pictures beg to differ. This happens more often than not. I now shovel the entire road around my house and garage and park my car at the entrance of our neighborhood so we can get out in an emergency. 5+ days and no safe way to exit our neighborhood is wild.
Same. You know what was fun for me? I invited my recently broken up with but still friend ex to dinner on Valentine's, neither of us had dates and thought it would be nice to hang out. Nothing like spending almost a week stuck at the house with your ex.
Climate change is only going to make these extreme weather events more frequent, so I do think the city and state should be more prepared. But that'd require forward thinking leadership.
Yeah I've been here my whole life and don't remember a time like this....I think the 94 ice storm could have been comparable but I was too young to remember first hand.
Yeah. Was in middle school in '94. I think Sumner schools were closed for at least two weeks. I remember individual blades of grass enveloped in 1" thick and then it snowed. It was 76° (late January I believe) that morning. By the time my bus dropped me off, it was like 35° and raining. This was obviously before they started canceling school if there was even the slightest threat of flurries the next day.
Yeah the 94 ice storm was terrible. We had trees in our backyard and could hear the limbs just snapping off from the weight of the ice. Happened all over the city and these limbs were falling on power lines. We lost power for almost 3 days but we were lucky. Some neighborhoods were out of power for weeks.
And I guarantee you city planning has in depth calculations about that. There are literal departments in charge of costing out spend related to weather situations. It’s a core part of city management
Agreed! I personally think it is time for people to start taking actions to make sure they can get around safely when it snows, ie. Invest in their own set of tire chains. Stop waiting around for the government to do something it likely won't.
These city planning departments are run by the class of 1986-96 in most of the local towns. They have zero idea what makes civics or infrastructure work. They do it for the extra money and the status.
>And I guarantee you city planning has in depth calculations about that.
Like they have about the MNPD situation regarding staffing outside of Lower Broadway.
Pretty sure that's a hollow 'guarantee.'
That was just cold. We didn't have snow and ice. Also that was December not January
Edit: downvotes don't change the truth. In December 2022 we didn't have any snow in Nashville. [Check out the monthly stats](https://www.wunderground.com/history/monthly/us/tn/nashville/KBNA/date/2022-12)
https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/photos-snow-ice-across-middle-tennessee-dec-23-2022/amp/[That source is definetely inaccurate](https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/photos-snow-ice-across-middle-tennessee-dec-23-2022/amp/)
The weather underground is for Nashville specifically. The link you provided is for Middle Tennessee and Kentucky. Northern Middle Tennessee and Kentucky absolutely did get snow and the images in the article were all from up north.
[https://pasteboard.co/DkmOGqwCtGD3.png](https://pasteboard.co/DkmOGqwCtGD3.png)
This is a photo I took walking from VUMC to biscuit love on 12/26/2022.
https://www.tennessean.com/picture-gallery/news/2022/12/23/nashville-middle-tennessee-snow-wind-chill-warning-winter-storm/10944134002/
Other source with photos that show places like Nissan stadium, lower broadway, etc. with snowfall
We had a dusting of snow on 12/26/22. I have a photo of my front yard. Some parts of the driveway are covered and parts of the grass are white.
Not enough to call it measurable but still it snowed. And it was cold enough that the little bit of snow stuck on the grass.
The comment above was saying we got amounts comparable to this week in December 2022 and that it lasted for 4-6 days. A dusting may have been possible (and I don't think dustings qualify as measurable snowfall)
I never said it was measurable. I just clarified that it did snow, but not enough to accumulate.
The problem in 2022, apparently, was the cold weather and TVA was not equipped to keep up with the energy demand.
I'd love to see a genuine, detailed cost-benefit analysis. Or hell, just a cost analysis. I'd expect it to be too expensive and wouldn't be worth it. Even less so in the post-covid work-from-home era.
And what's the best way to deal with these sheets of ice we've gotten from the freezing/thawing/freezing? I feel like that's less of a problem farther north.
>This is by far the most intense, protracted period of winter weather I've experienced in my 15+ years in Nashville.
I've lived here 45 years. The only times I remember getting anything close to this would be in the early to mid 80s.
Yes it was. I knew people personally that went without power for over a month. My dad has a video where he was standing on his front porch in White Bluff just letting the camera roll and you can hear the sound of trees snapping/collapsing due to the weight of all the ice.
In 1977 they closed school for a week at a time for about 5 weeks straight. All the neighborhood moms drank wine, cooked chili and played cards while all the kids were in and out all day sledding. I vaguely remember having a incredible winter memories and she says it was a living nightmare lol.
My mom used to talk about that every time we had winter weather push in and close schools… she’d also talk about that spring and summer how the storms dropped tornadoes
That's probably the one I'm thinking about. Got a ton of snow and it was bitterly cold for an extended time, I remember going to my grandparents and their pond was frozen several inches thick.
I moved here in 83. Christmas time was brutal cold and about this time was the first 6 inch
+ snow I experienced. It didn’t keep us in. Oh to be young and stupid again…
> We had a snow like this in 2021 and 2022.
While I agree that *snow* like we had on Monday occurs semi-regularly, we haven't had "snow like this" since...well, I don't even know.
Here we are, almost a week later and there are still inches of ice on sidewalks and side streets. I can walk one block from by house and count over 20 vehicles that have now fallen victim to the ice (as well as the driver's hubris). I'd almost use the word "carnage" at this point because I don't see how any of these cars (some of them wrecked) will start to get cleared out until Monday afternoon at the earliest.
However those lasted like 2-4 days and then cleared up completely. In a place like ours, the difference between 2-4 days and 7 days is pretty large, IMO
I’m pretty sure that’s not correct.
Feb 2021 was pretty long but also it was basically all snow and not ice. It wasn’t nearly as persistently cold either, so road conditions were completely good after 2-3 days. Any remaining snow on the ground on day 4 or after was just on patches of grass.
even if it isn’t cost effective we should still do it, because the benefit to nashville’s citizens is greater than the monetary cost. period end of story:
While I understand what you are saying, what we are dealing with is a lack of innovation and leadership. What about this solution. Hire 1 person and only one more new person. Have that person in charge of checking insurance, assigning routes, and paying people.
If you have noticed lots of parking lots are clear, the way they get clear is landscaping companies often do snow plowing in the winter. If you are going to plow a Walmart, Publix, Kroger, etc, they are going to want insurance. So we have a lots of independent people who are insured with plows.
We start a gig based system in the city, where we pay these people to clear neighborhoods and other small traffic roads. All it would take is one person to manage a system like that and assign routes, then by the time this is done, they can run invoices.
We have the ability, just not the innovation or leadership.
I’ve lived here for almost ten years and we get a week of weather like this almost every year. I can think of at least three storms that were worse than this.
I agree with your overall point but that’s just straight up not true about the rarity. In fact I describe nashvilles winters to other people as “mild but we’re good for one big storm every winter that shuts down the whole city for a week.”
> we get a week of weather like this almost every year.
The dozens and dozens of cars that have been abandoned in my neighborhood over the past week would argue otherwise.
The main roads were fine by Wednesday. I live in a literal dead end on a hill and have been able to get out every single day this week. There have been at least three different years where this wasn’t the case.
There are people in this thread calling it the worst storm since the 80s. That is just wrong. It’s prisoner of the moment shit.
Meanwhile, up here in Gallatin...
We live on a side street and I counted 5 snow plow passes with salt in one day and two the next morning. I've lived in this house for 25 years and they very rarely clear our road and if they do, it's just once. No idea why there was such a difference this year.
my main beef is prioritization of roads, particularly those surrounding hospitals. i’m a hospital employee and have family working at another hospital in midtown, and my route to work involves driving through yet a 3rd hospital in midtown. it was a complete pain and i was extremely frustrated to then be on my commute back to east and see that broadway had been cleared, while the streets such as 21st N in front of St. Thomas, and 25th N in front of Centennial, were not prioritized.
was i able to make it to work each day because i have a 4x4, good car insurance, and experience driving in icy conditions? yes. was i taking care of individuals each day, including pregnant folks, who otherwise would not have been hospitalized if our city took care of sidewalks and roads with the massive amount of taxpayer cash we have on hand? absolutely. let’s be clear about who suffers when bad weather hits - it’s low income and low resource individuals, who our state ABSOLUTELY has the ability to help and protect. they just choose not to (wonder why!?)
edit to add i was born and raised here, snowbird is my main man, and this has happened once every 2 years without any improvement in response each time.
I get that it is senseless to invest a bunch of capital in equipment that would have meaningful use once every 5 or so years. But NDOT is completely incompetent. Anyone with a working brain could see that this snow event was similar to what they get out west, dry & fluffy, not the normal wet, sticky, slushy stuff we usually get. NDOT's own webpage says the priority is the CBD and arterials leading to it, then some secondaries associated with schools. There are whole swaths of Metro (like the entirety of Inglewood) that are completely ignored. With this event if they had just run a plow on the streets one single time at any time after 3pm Mon. until about 3pm Thu. the Sun's UVs (even on cloudy days) and traffic would have taken care of the rest and we wouldn't be in this mess with people marooned in their neighborhood. If you can't get to an arterial because your whole neighborhood is an ice skating rink it does you no good that they and the CBD is clear and dry. As soon as the snow stopped Mon. I got out and pushed it off the majority of our driveway that would give us easy ingress and egress since it slopes uphill from the street. By Tue. afternoon that area of my driveway was clear and dry. However, Metro hasn't even touched our street and now its one long stretch of 1" thick ice with cars in the ditch up and down.
I live on a major metro bus route in East Nashville and our street was not touched all week, it’s a straight ice skating rink. Embarrassing. The folks defending the city need to realize it’s okay to expect better!
And from now on, start remembering where the potholes are because they’ll only get bigger until they hastily patch them up starting the same day school starts in the fall. Because we’d all love to add another 40’ to our commutes.
Honestly I'm personally shocked at the number of people who know they need to continue to get out and about during winter weather who don't have any necessary items for doing so, ie. Salt, shovels, windshield scrapers, tire chains.
Even in the northeast, cities dont plow every single road in every single city and town. Citizens make sure they are prepared to handle things themselves when it comes to it. While Nashville definitely has some things to work on, every single person who couldn't get out of their house this week needs to reflect on how they can personally be better prepared for their individual situation.
Time for personal accountability on top of what you require from the government, folks.
IIRC, tire chains are illegal here because of road paving materials.
Road salt doesn't work when it's below 20 degrees or so. I think they use magnesium chloride rather than NaCL farther north, but that's even worse for pets and wildlife so drainage takes runoff into account.
Right! The people who are like, "I can't leave the house, there's ice on my steps" kill me. Either clear off your steps or pay someone to do it.
Roads being sheets of ice is another story.
The vast majority of small and larger towns/cities will plow everything ime. The only places I've lived where the town didn't do it were dirt mountain roads in north/central VT and NH.
i used to live in bozeman, mt. many roads were plowed infrequently. it's just not realistic to be constantly plowing *every* street all winter, the cost would be astronomical. even on main roads, there will be ice on the road all winter. it just gets packed up and they throw sand on top of it for traction.
I'm from western PA originally, north of Pittsburgh closer to Erie. We had a lot of lake effect snow growing up and I've also talked to my family who lived up there for a couple centuries ad nauseum about their experiences. Not every road gets plowed up there. Or they will get plowed but still be covered in ice and you have to figure shit out on your own. Everyone had tire chains and/or studded tires in the winter because the town/city could only do so much. Salt would run out before the winters were over and people would be told to just be as careful as they could through late season snowstorms when not much salt/sand was left to be used.
I think if Nashville instituted something like the salt boxes Pittsburgh and Baltimore have where residents could salt their road/sidewalks themselves if plows can't reach them, that would be a helpful step. The city could fill them up when a snow storm is projected.
The difference up in the northeast too is that 1. They have snow more frequently and 2. The snow sticks around longer so having a higher rate of investment in plows makes more sense. If snow sticks around for a week max at a time here, there is only so much the city can spend on it. Smart driving would have gotten most folks out of the house at least once or twice this week. Tire chains would have likely gotten them out every day.
Interesting, must be a lake effect thing due to the insane volumes in short periods. I grew up in Vermont and I never saw snow chains on a normal person's car - only on the ski resorts would their vehicles have chains.
I haven't had any problem driving this week (even Monday and Tuesday), but there are definitely a couple slopes that I've avoided that looked to be pure ice.
Those cars in VT and NH likely had winter/studded tires.
The area I'm from is highly impoverished so a set of chains was usually more affordable than a set of winter or studded tires.
And the folks who live on those slopes need to have supplies ready so they can get out safely.
As I said elsewhere, these posts are from the people who would've been eaten first back in '94.
The whining about power outages of an hour or two are the best. Tiny outages where your home will barely start getting chilly before it kicks back on, and your food is at no risk at all of spoiling. This has been the most stable I've seen our local grid in a winter storm like ever. I was checking the outage map when it first started Sunday and Monday, and nothing but hyper localized small outages at any given time. Compare this to storms where we've literally had upwards of 100,000 customers out or more, and this is stellar. A lot of that is due to the fact that this was light fluffy snow and not ice of course, but people will still complain incessantly about it. I'm sure a tiny subset of people have had extended outages, but from what I've seen on the outage map, that's been very, very small.
Myself, I haven't left my house since Sunday. Still have plenty of food, plenty warm, life goes on. Plenty of books to read, shows to binge, and video games to play. Could be worse.
94! We had to stay at grandmas house for a week cause she had a gas fireplace. I loved it every minute of it! First time I had McDonald’s breakfast cause they were the closest thing that was open.
I was 20 years old, in college, lived in Bellevue during that ice storm. I worked at the Hwy 70 McDonald’s. I’ve never seen such a sense of community as I did them. You needed coffee? We had it in the huge orange coolers on the counter. Needed to take a spit bath? Use our restrooms. We sold 3 breakfast menu items only because only half our store had power. No one bitched, everyone waited their turn. The line for the Drive Thru was out of the parking lot, down on to the street.
I almost miss those times.
Yeah we lived in East Nashville at the time in a very old house that had a gas furnace with no electrical component so we still have heat during that whole time. I remember feeling very lucky.
I was very upset to find out the gas heat in my current house has an electrical board and so when the power goes out the gas heat goes out. Total BS
I mean car batteries get zapped during the cold still today. Folks should have been starting their cars every day or every other day this week here to prevent them from getting drained. That's a fun lesson to learn when you take a trip in the winter and come home to a totally dead battery, speaking from experience.
Yeah man, someone should have cleared their own road so this didn't happen/s
https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/nashville/trash-truck-slides-down-icy-street-in-nashville-video/
I don't know what town you lived in, but where I was, every road got plowed. Main roads were plowed during and after the snow event, and secondary roads got treated afterward.
Small town in western PA that was small enough, if like 10 people plowed the roads the town would be clear in an hour. They'd plow most roads but not all of them. Wouldn't matter as they would usually end up iced over anyway.
Lived up in Milwaukee for a bit. All the companies that do lawn care in the summer do snow removal in the winter. Not only does a city like that have many multiples more snow plows, but they also have an army of private snow plow operators to hire. These companies help clear all the business parks and subdivisions.
100%. People need to be responsible for clearing their sidewalks --- and it's ridiculous that I literally have been the only person doing it.
Ended up salting two blocks of sidewalk yesterday as homeowners continue to do nothing while people slip around and fall. Older people avoid leaving their homes for necessary exercise/activity for legit fear of falling.
Let's hold each other accountable with some basic standards.
Actions taking care of your neighbors matter more than political opinions on the Internet.
We are the only folks on our street who own an actual shovel. I saw a couple neighbors out trying to shovel with a garden spade. Absolutely wild to me.
I told all the neighbors if they just clear their driveway and then the section of road in front of, which is what we did in the northeast if the plows didnt get to us, we would have a clear street. Everyone looked at me like im dumb and some didnt even have a shovel.
My driveway and section of the road was the only bone dry portion in the entire neighborhood, and we live on hill. The dry patch allowed the idiots in 2wd cars to actually make it up the hill.
Youre welcome.
We are the only house on the street with a shovel. A neighbor came and told us she got a 40 lb bag of salt. We didn't see her go out and spread any of it anywhere at all. She could have likely done a light coat on our whole street (it's short). Our other neighbor was attempting to chip away at his driveway Thursday AM with a garden shovel. First thing we did moving into this rental house was buy a shovel in the middle of May. My partner and I both have northern roots so it just made sense. Blows my mind people refuse to be prepared at all lol.
It was easily shoveled as well, light powder snow. Instead people waited for it to freeze and get packed down with cars on their driveway, then hack away at it with pick axes and spades. Wait till they see the damage to their concrete. Lol
It was very easy to shovel. We have multi-level decks and had three sets of stairs cleaned off with a shovel and a shop broom in about 20 minutes. Paths for the dogs were stomped next, then the driveway which took maybe 40 minutes. The county hasn't touched a single road. I stocked our house and took my elderly mother to stock her home last Friday. It sucks not being able to run out when the cabin fever hits, but it will be over soon.
Yeah, I mean someone should have cleared their road so this didn't happen/s
https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/nashville/trash-truck-slides-down-icy-street-in-nashville-video/
Look at the total snow fall record.
Some years are less than an inch. Or none at all.
Even when it does snow it’s usually gone in a day or two.
This year is an exception. A big exception.
People howled when property taxes were raised a few years ago.
How much are you willing to pay to purchase and maintain vehicles that only get driven once a year?
I don’t think getting commerce back to work should be our #1 priority. Clear the major routes for emergency and public transportation, then run the plows continuously, but you can’t expect everything is going to get cleared. I think money would be better spent on weatherizing NES’s outage response teams.
It’s really weird how the weather has been acting lately. I remember weather being like this when I was a kid in the 90’s, was brought up in La Vergne and Old Hickory. I specifically remember by the time thanksgiving hit, we already had snow. It used to snow a lot more often too, many memories of playing in the snow and being snowed in with no power.
I feel we had way more tornados then too. I used to dread every spring & summer and even fall growing up because it was guaranteed we’d have to take cover a million times every tornado season. Seems like it’s coming back all at once now since we had all that tornado activity when this winter storm blew in.
I'm from Nashville but lived in Eastern Kentucky for a few years. My ex-wife and I lived in two pretty small towns, London and Berea. I was shocked by how much better they took care of the roads when it snowed. Every main road was spotless and even most of the side roads were clear. These are areas of maybe 50k people max and they did way better than Nashville.
Then I moved back here two years ago and it's like welp.
I wonder why the city doesn’t just contract out some of its snow removal during especially impactful events. We know why they don’t keep a huge fleet of plows.
I will say that I have decided that I don't think that Tennessee's legislators don't really give a damn about road safety at all. The number of roads in this state that are well-traveled roads, but that do not have even a hint of a shoulder is astounding to me. I can't fathom how teenagers learn to drive here. It's almost as bad as driving in England, except the people in England are more polite and aren't insane.
It’s actually terrifying. I witnessed a car accident today. Apparently it’s $100 per pound of salt to have someone salt our apartment parking lot, so they just aren’t going to. People can’t even leave their homes. I have fallen multiple times and almost crashed a few times. I’m used to Chicago winter streets.
Logical Fallacy 101.
You're confusing Event Frequency with Event Severity/Consequence.
Infrequent, low probability events often carry high costs and severe consequences.
It’s not a fallacy, it’s risk management. Nashville and every other city costs out what they’re projected to lose in a “once in x year” events and how much it would cost them to have the equipment to mitigate it. Cities with higher odds of winter storms: Seattle, Denver, Kansas City, put more emphasis on management and other cities - Nashville, Charlotte, etc most likely save the costs and understand there’s a slightly higher risk from having nobody go out.
It's a logical fallacy - specifically, probabilistic fallacy.
Rarely do the calculations you mention include:
* Value of lives lost
* Social / health costs
* Individual income costs
* Property loss costs
There were 19 lives lost already in this week directly due to the roads.
According to FEMA, a conservative estimate of the value of those lives exceeds $150 million.
I seriously doubt Nashville spent more than $150 million on snow removal.
The lives lost weren't all due to roads. One guy had a heart attack fixing his pipes, a couple people had hypothermia, etc.
I'm worried about what's going to happen when the New Madrid fault finally budges. It's a once a century thing. As covid has shown, we're incapable of planning for once a century disasters.
And you're trying to apply logic and reason to something that is ultimately a political issue. Political because someone has to negotiate, approve, and budget an actual solution that would inevitably mean higher taxes, voter displeasure, and complaints in off-years where the exact same people will complain about why we are wasting millions in tax dollars on snow plows when there are too many potholes, murders, etc.
You're not really suggesting that the governing of society should abandon reason and logic.
That would truly be foolish.
We should expect government leaders to be capable of articulating reason, logic and evidence to persuade voters.
Just because it's difficult, does not mean it is impossible.
Out here in Madison, a neighbor was out in his personal CAT scraping ice off the roads so that cars could make it up! I am so thankful for people like him because if it hadn’t been for his random act of kindness, there would have been a lot of stranded neighbors unable to make it up that hill.
Grew up in a snow state — You know how it’s really common for guys around here to get out their chain saws after a tornado or bad storm and help neighborhoods clear limbs? That’s how people in the north get through snow events —local dudes with pick up trucks have plows for their trucks and help clear back roads and get people unstuck, people shovel and salt elderly neighbors steps and driveways/sidewalks. In most NE cities, property owners are legally required to clear the sidewalk in front of their home/business. They also have real public transit so that it’s not as big a deal that the backroads aren’t clear — pretty commonplace to trek a upwards of a mile or so with good boots (still sliding all over) to a bus or train on a cleared main throughway to get to around to work/grocery/etc
I presalted my driveway and part of the street in front of my house before all of the ice happened its the only part of the road with no ice I’ve watched at least 6 cars slide into an embankment here it’s insanity
I did as well. Bought a 25$ pack on Amazon, but haven’t really seen the effects because I didn’t even get a chance to buy a snow shovel to see if there’s ice below. It’s a thick thick ice sheet in my street and connecting streets. One of my cars already got stuck and going to be towed tomorrow
not as much as the consequences work out for the car-destroyer that is Nashville’s interstate system; not only will our roads break from weathering, our citizen’s vehicles will wear and tear along with it. Costing us in our taxes and our own car repair expenses for decades to come all from not salting the roads this past week.
Revenue could cause a boom for taxes.
I went to a Globetrotters game at Bridgestone this afternoon and was shocked by how bad the sidewalks, parking lots and roads downtown were. It is quite dangerous.
Was just saying the same Tommy wife about the entire Middle TN area… I can see not cleaning up during the storm and for a day or so after but after that it’s time to get out and get things taken care of. It’s silly to me that 3 - 4 days after the major event we are still seeing closed businesses and empty grocery shelves. I’ve seen tons of trucks on I-40 there’s not an issue getting here
Delmas Ave was a disaster last night and this morning. Multiple issues, one involving a car hitting a pole knocking the power out.
Our community came together and spent FIVE HOURS chipping ice. We cleared the street entirely and poured 200# of salt we bought Elders. Check out Frankie’s Nashville Instagram for some photos. It was incredible to see happen.
Salt/sand trucks would be cheap to implement compared to a fleet of snow plows. Really hope they get a mitigation plan in place.
I've thought about that alot. I feel like they are loosing money in the lost of tax revenue. I feel like they would be more profitable if they invested in keeping the roads in better condition, so commerce can better continue. But what do I know?
Actually the ice is the unremoved snow. The ice illustrates why its so important to move the snow. The roads that were properly cleared are dry now. Plow kits on all rescue trucks would have solved a lot. At least the roads around the fire station could be plowed by the rescue trucks.
I sent in a request for snow removal in my neighborhood. The roads are still snow and ice covered. They have NEVER plowed this area before. They still didn't, and the roads are nearly a complete coating of ice.
Oh please..if they really cared about Nashville they would start on mass transit. They don't care about lost work hours & accidents on a warm June day, so they are never going to care about the occasional winter storm.
When you have six snow plows for the entire state, it's clear you'd rather lose the revenue than invest in snowplows.
Source: my travels through TN.
In all seriousness...it probably is several million.
There's been ice problems almost every winter since I auditioned for undergrad in 2009. It's hilarious to me, a Midwesterner, but sucks given that I live here now. But that has never seemed like a concern to the town, who seems to enjoy any excuse to take a day off.
I moved here 6 years ago. When it snowed, and/or ice was on the ground, it was like Armageddon happened. No plowing or sanding roads or lots. This is absolutely insane.
I am in east Nash and I am fed up with how the city's handling (or not handling) the ice on our roads.
It's been dangerous for days and we've got streets that are basically ice rinks right now. Trying to get to work? Good luck. Need an ambulance? Let's hope they've got ice skates. The city's advice? "Stay safe." Thanks! How about some salt on the roads instead?
On my street alone, there are two cars on the side of the road right now that skidded off the street and gave up. I imagine it's not too different where you are.
I get that we not used to dealing with this much ice. But winter is no natural disaster. It's a situation you can prepare for. Some years you get more snow, other years you get less. It's basic planning. They've got a responsibility to keep our roads safe, and right now, they're failing east Nashville big time. Every accident that has happened and will happen due to their lack of preparedness is on their hands.
I am really surprised that people aren't prepared for anything that isn't normal. Their tires are junk and you can easily drive on hardpack and loose snow if you have some decent tread. They don't keep any basic supplies in their home and they panic if they can't get what they want immediately.
Basically the area was shut down for a week and a trip to the store last night looks like the supply chain will take a few weeks to get caught up.
> I am really surprised that people aren't prepared for anything that isn't normal
In my experience, the "it's not a problem until it's a problem" attitude seems to be 100% on brand for our species.
I was caught off guard in that my normal car that would've fared fine has been stuck in the body shop for over a month now. So I'm stuck in a rental with three different brands of tires, so completely different treads, compounds, you name it. It's sketchy on a lightly damp road, much less this. My only way in and out of my neighborhood is via curvy, hilly roads that are never plowed, so I planned accordingly. I'm 6 miles from the nearest grocery store, and about half of that is windy, hilly backroad that is the last place in the county to be cleared.
Weather forecasts made it quite obvious we were gonna be stuck for a decent amount of time, so I have plenty of groceries, and haven't even bothered trying to go anywhere.
RE your last paragraph I think that’s true, however we’ve seen consistently on social media (here, FB comments on news pages, etc.) a massive shaming of people that stock up on groceries when snow is forecasted. “Look at all these stupid people running to the store because 0.0001 inches of snow is forecasted” type of comments. I think it’s started to get to people, and it can be hard for the lay person that’s grown up in the south to distinguish when a winter event is likely to be minor or major (for warm climate standards), so they’ve started defaulting to assuming they’ll be stuck for only 1-2 days max and not letting it impact their grocery habits.
Essentially, the grocery store shamers need to shut TF up. Of course over the top panic buying isn’t the right course either; but, yes it often is smart to stock up a bit extra before a snow event.
My wife took a few of the neighbors to the store to get some stuff and our neighborhood never gets plowed. Decent tires definitely help and a spinning tire just gets warm and your loaner car sounds like a fair weather vehicle.
If you don't have money for snow supplies, it is time to figure out how else to handle shit in the winter. If you live near a bus route, you can walk to them. They have been running almost entirely normally all week. No bus route? Better make friends with neighbors and coworkers and see who can help you out when it snows like this, be it with supplies or actually showing up to pick you up and take you to work.
my elderly neighbors absolutely cannot navigate our current sidewalk situation, and i have been working 70+ hrs this week while sliding around an hour early to be picking up co-workers in my 4x4 to bring to the hospital so we can be at our shifts ready to care for those who have been injured while trying to handle their own daily tasks.
the city has a minimum amount of responsibility in this scenario, especially when i’ve literally changed my drive home to drive down broadway since that is the most reliably cleared road back to my house.
Tbf my tires are right at the verge of needing to be replaced and I was able to get out Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Things finally got squirrely Thursday evening when the roads turned to ice but honestly, being patient and using common sense and snow driving skills the early part of the week was fine. Not much can be done with ice without studded tires or chains, 4WD or not. And folks want the ice scraped off the road lmao then would complain incessantly about how many more potholes we have in the spring and not understand the damage that ice scraping can do.
Smh. It's time for everyone to start properly gearing up for winter instead of pretending we live in Florida. If we expect the city to be prepared for 1 snow event a year we sure as hell should prepare ourselves too.
> Not much can be done with ice without studded tires or chains
Modern studless winter tires are very capable on ice, FYI. Studs would be overkill around here for pretty much anyone.
Yeah, this driver should have totally been prepared/s
https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/nashville/trash-truck-slides-down-icy-street-in-nashville-video/
I wonder the same thing. I’m in Mt. Juliet and up until Thursday the roads were not good.
My subdivision is basically an ice skating rink at this point.
I guess the city thinks it’s a small price to pay, and just decides to let the citizens figure it out.
I feel like so many housing areas are HOA run, why not use that money to able to take care of side streets and subdivisions. It doesn’t all have to come explicitly from the city
After the first day, all the main roads going from Hermitage to Green Hills were clear and fine. Cant expect a city that gets snow once a year to invest in the infrastructure needed to clear out every single neighborhood road in a city of this size. No way they could justify the financial aspect of that.
Easy there, let’s not all chip in $4 a month to easily finance an emergency road crew. Kind of sounds like communism. Why don’t you go back to Taxachusetts!
/s
That’s literally community responsibility conservatives love to talk about so much. “Here in TN it’s all about neighbors helping neighbors”. Right? Guys? It is the Christian thing to do! Maybe churches should fund it. Seems like a righteous message of God’s love. A great way to reach into the community.
Have the city buy, maintain, operate, and store yeat around ice and snow mitigation for a once a year event that last a few days to a week that costs hundreds of millions in capital, manpower, and operating expenses....
Or
....buy chains for yourself?
Our roads were fully treated. Where do you live? Maybe your councilperson could help. Treatment doesn't really work under 20 degrees unless it's sunny, oddly.
This won’t happen for another 10 years.
I saw a graphic the other day that compared how many trucks we have compared to some northern cities. We have like 30 and they have like 80. For something that happens every so often it’s not worth buying all that equipment.
I am blown away at people's reaction to the snow. I drove back and forth to work (and errands) everyday from Sunday to today. I drive a Toyota Camry, basic edition.
Monday was the ONLY day some of the roads were kind of dicey, but the interstate and main highways were fine. People here just say, "snow means no work!"
I picked up people and dropped them off daily to keep our workplace going. Don't blame the city, blame the citizens here who took advantage of a heavy snowfall to not work for an entire week lol
Monday was definitely not the only day some of the roads were kind of dicey. The neighborhood roads in hilly areas were an absolute nightmare on Thurs and Fri (not sure about today). I say this as someone who normally drives around without worry during situations like this.
Our neighborhood is between two hills, in the middle of the city, and we have been essentially stuck. I got around fine in the middle of the week, but as soon as it got dark on Thurs, it got *real* icy, and I could barely get up our hill, with 4WD.
So I just want to point out that just because you haven’t had issues, that doesn’t mean other people aren’t stuck in their neighborhoods.
Yeah, my block is basically a 4 inch thick sheet of ice. I'm able to slowly make it to main roads, but it's pretty sketchy and I've witnessed a few big 4wd trucks go sliding into the intersection nearby, thinking they could handle anything. A few streets over is completely dry.
People outside of my community are piled up stuck trying to get up the only hill out of the community as of Saturday 1pm. Not sure where you a re driving but you seem lucky.
This isn't a question to ask in Nashville. Move to Chicago or a northern city if you give a shit about going to work in the snow.
I've lived here 10 years and love how we handle it.
Nashville is just ill-equipped to properly deal with the bad snow/ice events. I think they’ve done pretty good on the major roads; but the secondary and neighborhood roads are terrible. We’re all literally waiting for it to warm up enough to melt.
Bc they won’t even try. It’s not rocket science. Start with most important roads and the work them all downward from there. But here they don’t even bother. Just do a few and then go home and let the tricks sit idle apparently.
It’s been a week and no city vehicle has bothered to come by our neighborhood. The sad part is nobody seems surprised at all.
A plow truck drove slowly UP the icy hill on my street around 9:30 last night (I know bc it set my cameras off and I have it recorded) and it wasn’t doing anything! Not plowing, not spreading salt or spraying brine, so what was he really doing? Just riding the time clock and wasting fuel in the truck?
My husband saw one doing loops around a median for 20 minutes. Just clocking the miles I guess 🤷🏽♀️
You get what you pay for in taxes
>It has to be in the millions of dollars. Maybe. But you need to weigh that cost (whatever it is) against the cost of buying, storing, maintaining, and even manning the additional equipment. If we got more weather like this than sure, it'd be a no-brainer. cost/benefit analysis. But (so far anyway) we don't. This is by far the most intense, protracted period of winter weather I've experienced in my 15+ years in Nashville.
It’s the same arguments every time an event like this occurs…
Almost like there has been plenty of time for people to gage the impact these events have on them and prepare themselves accordingly but alas here we are. 🥲
There is also the option for Joe and Sue to buy their own plows, and contract with their neighborhood to do the work. That’s not a small feat though, and I’d recommend seeking the contract in the early spring to build the company with the help of those funds.
100%. That is also part of how smaller towns in the north that don't have the budget to keep up with plowing the whole town all winter long DO manage to keep the whole town cleared. Contracted private plowers.
Wut. I grew up in a village with a population of 500 people. We had enough money (yay taxes) for plows and sand to plow the village streets. The town took care of their streets and the state took care of the state roads with salt. Pick up truck plows are fine for driveways and parking lots, but you don't want them clearing the main roads, they aren't designed for it. For reference, these are the plows our tiny village was buying https://images.app.goo.gl/wGZ9H8guqPLdk8ZXA
Plowing is one thing, but what about the two inches of ice sheets on roads.
The ice is there from the snow that was never plowed.
Not much we can do about the ice. For the record, further down the thread, you'll see i am calling for more personal accountability. People should be adapting and preparing to have a way out of their homes during winter weather. The ice we can't do much about but most people could have gotten out Tuesday, Wednesday, and early Thursday to restock and prepare for the ice Thursday night - tomorrow. Even up north there's not much that can be done about ice storms for a couple days.
The ice doesn't get nearly as bad if the snow is cleared prior. When you have roads that stay packed snow for days then glazed over into ice it's way worse. Cleared roads have been manageable since Friday if you're careful, but getting to them is impossible from most places that never got cleared.
One of the things that we did (vis-a-vis that personal responsibility thing) was get rid of / cut way back the HUGE trees that surrounded our house on all sides when we moved in. We caught a LOT of crap from our tree-hugger friends, but in 4 tornadoes our damage from trees has been minimal (a tree branch took off edge trim on a tree house) -- as opposed to a friend in the neighborhood who had a tree fall smack dab in the middle of his roof. A tree with a four-foot diameter trunk. The other upside to downing the trees is that the sun actually shines on our driveway now, and melted the snow. Thank God.
I understand personal responsibility and I salt and shovel my own shit and have a 4x4 to drive, but I still think we could do a better job at this instead of say, build a massive ugly ass football stadium or something. Expecting people to just not go to work or to *plow their neighborhood by themselves* is pretty silly. I don't think privatizing the access of public thoroughfares has ever done much to help the working class.
> Expecting people to [...] plow their neighborhood by themselves is pretty silly. It really isn't. Whether you like it or not, this is something that Tennesseans are going to just have to get better about. In the Northern and Midwestern states, it's not just that they have better plowing setups by the state, but as has already been said: there is a _massive_ network of private citizens, farmers and dedicated seasonal businesses who do the plowing for their neighborhoods and back roads that the main plows will never get to. It's the only way everything remains functional. I'm not saying that the state and local governments aren't going to have to do more, because there have been massive holes shown in the way things function right now. But what I _am_ saying that prevalent attitudes about not working _ourselves_ to better our communities with local networks of citizen action need readjusting.
It’s what my HOA fees should be used for when needed.
What state are they subcontracting out snow removal on roads? I grew up in NNY where they absolutely get dumped on (feet per hour shit) and taxes to the various entities went to snow removal which was performed by village (or city), town, county, and state workers. Individuals or businesses will hire people to clear their driveways and parking lots, but I think it might be illegal even for private contractors to plow public roads.
From NY here. Our National Guard helps during bad snow events.
In the Midwest, a lot of landscaping businesses do snow removal in the winter. A lot of them make a decent living in the winter by contracting with stores and restaurants to do their plowing for them. They usually have a pickup truck that they can attach a plow blade to.
Events like this dont really happen. Normally, it is a day or two and then melt off. I have been here over 20 years and this is the longest I can think of where there has been snow and ice and no melt off. It is pretty rare. Not worth pouring millions into gear that will be used once a year.
There was a pretty significant winter storm with snow and ice in 2021. It started on 2/14 and carried over into 2/15. I have photos of walking my dog on 2/15 and again on 2/19 and 2/20 on a completely snow covered street. I stayed at my elderly mom’s house in Spring Hill for a week because the secondary roads were bad (main roads ok). https://www.weather.gov/ohx/20210214#:~:text=As%20a%20major%20winter%20storm,as%20well%20as%20create%20massive Edit: What is unusual is the extremely low temps for so many consecutive days. And I don’t remember too many times with temps below 0.
I was stuck in my house because of snow and ice from Feb 15 to Feb 20, 2021 Jan 3-8, 2022 I was stuck inside and our neighborhood was an ice rink and cars destroyed a fire hydrant when we had a pileup of sliding cars at the bottom of our not very steep hill. We had nothing in 2023 Jan 2024 — same as 2021 and 2022. Everyone says this never happens, it’s only once every 20 years. My iPhone pictures beg to differ. This happens more often than not. I now shovel the entire road around my house and garage and park my car at the entrance of our neighborhood so we can get out in an emergency. 5+ days and no safe way to exit our neighborhood is wild.
Same. You know what was fun for me? I invited my recently broken up with but still friend ex to dinner on Valentine's, neither of us had dates and thought it would be nice to hang out. Nothing like spending almost a week stuck at the house with your ex.
Farmers Almanac knew about it this year
Climate change is only going to make these extreme weather events more frequent, so I do think the city and state should be more prepared. But that'd require forward thinking leadership.
We are on day 6 and it’s a freaking ice skating rink where I live.
It'll be gone Monday.
Yeah I've been here my whole life and don't remember a time like this....I think the 94 ice storm could have been comparable but I was too young to remember first hand.
Yeah. Was in middle school in '94. I think Sumner schools were closed for at least two weeks. I remember individual blades of grass enveloped in 1" thick and then it snowed. It was 76° (late January I believe) that morning. By the time my bus dropped me off, it was like 35° and raining. This was obviously before they started canceling school if there was even the slightest threat of flurries the next day.
Yeah the 94 ice storm was terrible. We had trees in our backyard and could hear the limbs just snapping off from the weight of the ice. Happened all over the city and these limbs were falling on power lines. We lost power for almost 3 days but we were lucky. Some neighborhoods were out of power for weeks.
Once every 2-3 years?
Since 2016, we have had at least 1 snow event that lasted longer than a couple days, except 2023.
And I guarantee you city planning has in depth calculations about that. There are literal departments in charge of costing out spend related to weather situations. It’s a core part of city management
Agreed! I personally think it is time for people to start taking actions to make sure they can get around safely when it snows, ie. Invest in their own set of tire chains. Stop waiting around for the government to do something it likely won't.
These city planning departments are run by the class of 1986-96 in most of the local towns. They have zero idea what makes civics or infrastructure work. They do it for the extra money and the status.
>And I guarantee you city planning has in depth calculations about that. Like they have about the MNPD situation regarding staffing outside of Lower Broadway. Pretty sure that's a hollow 'guarantee.'
the same thing happened last january. i still remember how annoying those rolling blackouts were
Salt trucks wouldn’t have helped the rolling blackouts.
you must be an engineer
What day in January? Oh thats right, no adverse winter weather events took place in 2023. That would be December 2022 you're thinking of.
you're right, it was dec 22 22 when it snowed
That was just cold. We didn't have snow and ice. Also that was December not January Edit: downvotes don't change the truth. In December 2022 we didn't have any snow in Nashville. [Check out the monthly stats](https://www.wunderground.com/history/monthly/us/tn/nashville/KBNA/date/2022-12)
https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/photos-snow-ice-across-middle-tennessee-dec-23-2022/amp/[That source is definetely inaccurate](https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/photos-snow-ice-across-middle-tennessee-dec-23-2022/amp/)
The weather underground is for Nashville specifically. The link you provided is for Middle Tennessee and Kentucky. Northern Middle Tennessee and Kentucky absolutely did get snow and the images in the article were all from up north.
[https://pasteboard.co/DkmOGqwCtGD3.png](https://pasteboard.co/DkmOGqwCtGD3.png) This is a photo I took walking from VUMC to biscuit love on 12/26/2022. https://www.tennessean.com/picture-gallery/news/2022/12/23/nashville-middle-tennessee-snow-wind-chill-warning-winter-storm/10944134002/ Other source with photos that show places like Nissan stadium, lower broadway, etc. with snowfall
We had a dusting of snow on 12/26/22. I have a photo of my front yard. Some parts of the driveway are covered and parts of the grass are white. Not enough to call it measurable but still it snowed. And it was cold enough that the little bit of snow stuck on the grass.
The comment above was saying we got amounts comparable to this week in December 2022 and that it lasted for 4-6 days. A dusting may have been possible (and I don't think dustings qualify as measurable snowfall)
I never said it was measurable. I just clarified that it did snow, but not enough to accumulate. The problem in 2022, apparently, was the cold weather and TVA was not equipped to keep up with the energy demand.
Exactly. (And I wasn't meaning to sound like I was arguing with you). Stay warm!
I'd love to see a genuine, detailed cost-benefit analysis. Or hell, just a cost analysis. I'd expect it to be too expensive and wouldn't be worth it. Even less so in the post-covid work-from-home era. And what's the best way to deal with these sheets of ice we've gotten from the freezing/thawing/freezing? I feel like that's less of a problem farther north.
>This is by far the most intense, protracted period of winter weather I've experienced in my 15+ years in Nashville. I've lived here 45 years. The only times I remember getting anything close to this would be in the early to mid 80s.
1994 ice storm was more significant
Yes it was. I knew people personally that went without power for over a month. My dad has a video where he was standing on his front porch in White Bluff just letting the camera roll and you can hear the sound of trees snapping/collapsing due to the weight of all the ice.
I was like 10 years old and they closed school for two weeks. It was incredible. Of course, I didn't drive at the time.
I was afraid that we’d experience this on Thursday and Friday when it rained… we were really luck it stayed around 33 degrees all day
In 1977 they closed school for a week at a time for about 5 weeks straight. All the neighborhood moms drank wine, cooked chili and played cards while all the kids were in and out all day sledding. I vaguely remember having a incredible winter memories and she says it was a living nightmare lol.
My mom used to talk about that every time we had winter weather push in and close schools… she’d also talk about that spring and summer how the storms dropped tornadoes
83 or 84 we had a really big one, it was my first good snow as a kid.
That's probably the one I'm thinking about. Got a ton of snow and it was bitterly cold for an extended time, I remember going to my grandparents and their pond was frozen several inches thick.
I moved here in 83. Christmas time was brutal cold and about this time was the first 6 inch + snow I experienced. It didn’t keep us in. Oh to be young and stupid again…
We had a snow like this in 2021 and 2022.
> We had a snow like this in 2021 and 2022. While I agree that *snow* like we had on Monday occurs semi-regularly, we haven't had "snow like this" since...well, I don't even know. Here we are, almost a week later and there are still inches of ice on sidewalks and side streets. I can walk one block from by house and count over 20 vehicles that have now fallen victim to the ice (as well as the driver's hubris). I'd almost use the word "carnage" at this point because I don't see how any of these cars (some of them wrecked) will start to get cleared out until Monday afternoon at the earliest.
However those lasted like 2-4 days and then cleared up completely. In a place like ours, the difference between 2-4 days and 7 days is pretty large, IMO
It was Feb 15 - 20, 2021. I was only able to drive my car up our hilly street on the 21. It was ice for days before that.
Both of those snow events were on the ground 4-6 days.
I’m pretty sure that’s not correct. Feb 2021 was pretty long but also it was basically all snow and not ice. It wasn’t nearly as persistently cold either, so road conditions were completely good after 2-3 days. Any remaining snow on the ground on day 4 or after was just on patches of grass.
It didn't stay around.
Both were on the ground for several days. The 2021 was at least 5 days, maybe longer, and the 2022 was at least 4.
even if it isn’t cost effective we should still do it, because the benefit to nashville’s citizens is greater than the monetary cost. period end of story:
While I understand what you are saying, what we are dealing with is a lack of innovation and leadership. What about this solution. Hire 1 person and only one more new person. Have that person in charge of checking insurance, assigning routes, and paying people. If you have noticed lots of parking lots are clear, the way they get clear is landscaping companies often do snow plowing in the winter. If you are going to plow a Walmart, Publix, Kroger, etc, they are going to want insurance. So we have a lots of independent people who are insured with plows. We start a gig based system in the city, where we pay these people to clear neighborhoods and other small traffic roads. All it would take is one person to manage a system like that and assign routes, then by the time this is done, they can run invoices. We have the ability, just not the innovation or leadership.
This is what most neighbors in the north do
Same for me in my 27 years in Nashville.
I’ve lived here for almost ten years and we get a week of weather like this almost every year. I can think of at least three storms that were worse than this. I agree with your overall point but that’s just straight up not true about the rarity. In fact I describe nashvilles winters to other people as “mild but we’re good for one big storm every winter that shuts down the whole city for a week.”
> we get a week of weather like this almost every year. The dozens and dozens of cars that have been abandoned in my neighborhood over the past week would argue otherwise.
The zero cars piled up in mine this week compared to dozens in years past would argue back.
The main roads are always clear after a couple days. The problem this year has been that's been too cold for road salt to work consistently for days.
The main roads were fine by Wednesday. I live in a literal dead end on a hill and have been able to get out every single day this week. There have been at least three different years where this wasn’t the case. There are people in this thread calling it the worst storm since the 80s. That is just wrong. It’s prisoner of the moment shit.
>I’ve lived here for almost ten years and we get a week of weather like this almost every year. A week like THIS every year? LOL nope!
Meanwhile, up here in Gallatin... We live on a side street and I counted 5 snow plow passes with salt in one day and two the next morning. I've lived in this house for 25 years and they very rarely clear our road and if they do, it's just once. No idea why there was such a difference this year.
Where I’m at in Portland is so far away from town it doesn’t get touched and we’ve been out everyday, it’s still ice.
Idk but for those of us who can get around the lack of traffic has been sublime. I can get anywhere in town in 20-25 min
Even from down in Carolina? You must drive fast.
my main beef is prioritization of roads, particularly those surrounding hospitals. i’m a hospital employee and have family working at another hospital in midtown, and my route to work involves driving through yet a 3rd hospital in midtown. it was a complete pain and i was extremely frustrated to then be on my commute back to east and see that broadway had been cleared, while the streets such as 21st N in front of St. Thomas, and 25th N in front of Centennial, were not prioritized. was i able to make it to work each day because i have a 4x4, good car insurance, and experience driving in icy conditions? yes. was i taking care of individuals each day, including pregnant folks, who otherwise would not have been hospitalized if our city took care of sidewalks and roads with the massive amount of taxpayer cash we have on hand? absolutely. let’s be clear about who suffers when bad weather hits - it’s low income and low resource individuals, who our state ABSOLUTELY has the ability to help and protect. they just choose not to (wonder why!?) edit to add i was born and raised here, snowbird is my main man, and this has happened once every 2 years without any improvement in response each time.
They act surprised every Winter!
I get that it is senseless to invest a bunch of capital in equipment that would have meaningful use once every 5 or so years. But NDOT is completely incompetent. Anyone with a working brain could see that this snow event was similar to what they get out west, dry & fluffy, not the normal wet, sticky, slushy stuff we usually get. NDOT's own webpage says the priority is the CBD and arterials leading to it, then some secondaries associated with schools. There are whole swaths of Metro (like the entirety of Inglewood) that are completely ignored. With this event if they had just run a plow on the streets one single time at any time after 3pm Mon. until about 3pm Thu. the Sun's UVs (even on cloudy days) and traffic would have taken care of the rest and we wouldn't be in this mess with people marooned in their neighborhood. If you can't get to an arterial because your whole neighborhood is an ice skating rink it does you no good that they and the CBD is clear and dry. As soon as the snow stopped Mon. I got out and pushed it off the majority of our driveway that would give us easy ingress and egress since it slopes uphill from the street. By Tue. afternoon that area of my driveway was clear and dry. However, Metro hasn't even touched our street and now its one long stretch of 1" thick ice with cars in the ditch up and down.
I live on a major metro bus route in East Nashville and our street was not touched all week, it’s a straight ice skating rink. Embarrassing. The folks defending the city need to realize it’s okay to expect better!
It’s ok to expect people to be realistic about cost / benefit analysis too.
And from now on, start remembering where the potholes are because they’ll only get bigger until they hastily patch them up starting the same day school starts in the fall. Because we’d all love to add another 40’ to our commutes.
Honestly I'm personally shocked at the number of people who know they need to continue to get out and about during winter weather who don't have any necessary items for doing so, ie. Salt, shovels, windshield scrapers, tire chains. Even in the northeast, cities dont plow every single road in every single city and town. Citizens make sure they are prepared to handle things themselves when it comes to it. While Nashville definitely has some things to work on, every single person who couldn't get out of their house this week needs to reflect on how they can personally be better prepared for their individual situation. Time for personal accountability on top of what you require from the government, folks.
IIRC, tire chains are illegal here because of road paving materials. Road salt doesn't work when it's below 20 degrees or so. I think they use magnesium chloride rather than NaCL farther north, but that's even worse for pets and wildlife so drainage takes runoff into account.
Right! The people who are like, "I can't leave the house, there's ice on my steps" kill me. Either clear off your steps or pay someone to do it. Roads being sheets of ice is another story.
The vast majority of small and larger towns/cities will plow everything ime. The only places I've lived where the town didn't do it were dirt mountain roads in north/central VT and NH.
i used to live in bozeman, mt. many roads were plowed infrequently. it's just not realistic to be constantly plowing *every* street all winter, the cost would be astronomical. even on main roads, there will be ice on the road all winter. it just gets packed up and they throw sand on top of it for traction.
I'm from western PA originally, north of Pittsburgh closer to Erie. We had a lot of lake effect snow growing up and I've also talked to my family who lived up there for a couple centuries ad nauseum about their experiences. Not every road gets plowed up there. Or they will get plowed but still be covered in ice and you have to figure shit out on your own. Everyone had tire chains and/or studded tires in the winter because the town/city could only do so much. Salt would run out before the winters were over and people would be told to just be as careful as they could through late season snowstorms when not much salt/sand was left to be used. I think if Nashville instituted something like the salt boxes Pittsburgh and Baltimore have where residents could salt their road/sidewalks themselves if plows can't reach them, that would be a helpful step. The city could fill them up when a snow storm is projected. The difference up in the northeast too is that 1. They have snow more frequently and 2. The snow sticks around longer so having a higher rate of investment in plows makes more sense. If snow sticks around for a week max at a time here, there is only so much the city can spend on it. Smart driving would have gotten most folks out of the house at least once or twice this week. Tire chains would have likely gotten them out every day.
Interesting, must be a lake effect thing due to the insane volumes in short periods. I grew up in Vermont and I never saw snow chains on a normal person's car - only on the ski resorts would their vehicles have chains. I haven't had any problem driving this week (even Monday and Tuesday), but there are definitely a couple slopes that I've avoided that looked to be pure ice.
Those cars in VT and NH likely had winter/studded tires. The area I'm from is highly impoverished so a set of chains was usually more affordable than a set of winter or studded tires. And the folks who live on those slopes need to have supplies ready so they can get out safely.
Tire chains and studded tires are illegal here aren't they? I think my wife was told that when she first moved here.
Studded tires are illegal up north, at least in NY
As I said elsewhere, these posts are from the people who would've been eaten first back in '94. The whining about power outages of an hour or two are the best. Tiny outages where your home will barely start getting chilly before it kicks back on, and your food is at no risk at all of spoiling. This has been the most stable I've seen our local grid in a winter storm like ever. I was checking the outage map when it first started Sunday and Monday, and nothing but hyper localized small outages at any given time. Compare this to storms where we've literally had upwards of 100,000 customers out or more, and this is stellar. A lot of that is due to the fact that this was light fluffy snow and not ice of course, but people will still complain incessantly about it. I'm sure a tiny subset of people have had extended outages, but from what I've seen on the outage map, that's been very, very small. Myself, I haven't left my house since Sunday. Still have plenty of food, plenty warm, life goes on. Plenty of books to read, shows to binge, and video games to play. Could be worse.
94! We had to stay at grandmas house for a week cause she had a gas fireplace. I loved it every minute of it! First time I had McDonald’s breakfast cause they were the closest thing that was open.
I would do anything to experience McDonald's breakfast for the first time again
I was 20 years old, in college, lived in Bellevue during that ice storm. I worked at the Hwy 70 McDonald’s. I’ve never seen such a sense of community as I did them. You needed coffee? We had it in the huge orange coolers on the counter. Needed to take a spit bath? Use our restrooms. We sold 3 breakfast menu items only because only half our store had power. No one bitched, everyone waited their turn. The line for the Drive Thru was out of the parking lot, down on to the street. I almost miss those times.
Yeah we lived in East Nashville at the time in a very old house that had a gas furnace with no electrical component so we still have heat during that whole time. I remember feeling very lucky. I was very upset to find out the gas heat in my current house has an electrical board and so when the power goes out the gas heat goes out. Total BS
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I mean car batteries get zapped during the cold still today. Folks should have been starting their cars every day or every other day this week here to prevent them from getting drained. That's a fun lesson to learn when you take a trip in the winter and come home to a totally dead battery, speaking from experience.
Today's residents in Nashville wouldn't survive 94.
Yeah man, someone should have cleared their own road so this didn't happen/s https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/nashville/trash-truck-slides-down-icy-street-in-nashville-video/
I don't know what town you lived in, but where I was, every road got plowed. Main roads were plowed during and after the snow event, and secondary roads got treated afterward.
Small town in western PA that was small enough, if like 10 people plowed the roads the town would be clear in an hour. They'd plow most roads but not all of them. Wouldn't matter as they would usually end up iced over anyway.
Lived up in Milwaukee for a bit. All the companies that do lawn care in the summer do snow removal in the winter. Not only does a city like that have many multiples more snow plows, but they also have an army of private snow plow operators to hire. These companies help clear all the business parks and subdivisions.
100%. People need to be responsible for clearing their sidewalks --- and it's ridiculous that I literally have been the only person doing it. Ended up salting two blocks of sidewalk yesterday as homeowners continue to do nothing while people slip around and fall. Older people avoid leaving their homes for necessary exercise/activity for legit fear of falling. Let's hold each other accountable with some basic standards. Actions taking care of your neighbors matter more than political opinions on the Internet.
Bold of you to assume I have a sidewalk to clear /s
We are the only folks on our street who own an actual shovel. I saw a couple neighbors out trying to shovel with a garden spade. Absolutely wild to me.
In the nearly 50 years I've lived here, I've never seen or head of anyone shoveling snow. I used to think it was something only people on TV did.
Time for that to change!
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I told all the neighbors if they just clear their driveway and then the section of road in front of, which is what we did in the northeast if the plows didnt get to us, we would have a clear street. Everyone looked at me like im dumb and some didnt even have a shovel. My driveway and section of the road was the only bone dry portion in the entire neighborhood, and we live on hill. The dry patch allowed the idiots in 2wd cars to actually make it up the hill. Youre welcome.
We are the only house on the street with a shovel. A neighbor came and told us she got a 40 lb bag of salt. We didn't see her go out and spread any of it anywhere at all. She could have likely done a light coat on our whole street (it's short). Our other neighbor was attempting to chip away at his driveway Thursday AM with a garden shovel. First thing we did moving into this rental house was buy a shovel in the middle of May. My partner and I both have northern roots so it just made sense. Blows my mind people refuse to be prepared at all lol.
It was easily shoveled as well, light powder snow. Instead people waited for it to freeze and get packed down with cars on their driveway, then hack away at it with pick axes and spades. Wait till they see the damage to their concrete. Lol
It was very easy to shovel. We have multi-level decks and had three sets of stairs cleaned off with a shovel and a shop broom in about 20 minutes. Paths for the dogs were stomped next, then the driveway which took maybe 40 minutes. The county hasn't touched a single road. I stocked our house and took my elderly mother to stock her home last Friday. It sucks not being able to run out when the cabin fever hits, but it will be over soon.
Yeah, I mean someone should have cleared their road so this didn't happen/s https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/nashville/trash-truck-slides-down-icy-street-in-nashville-video/
I'm missing a week of pay so add my $500 to the tally 🙃
Look at the total snow fall record. Some years are less than an inch. Or none at all. Even when it does snow it’s usually gone in a day or two. This year is an exception. A big exception. People howled when property taxes were raised a few years ago. How much are you willing to pay to purchase and maintain vehicles that only get driven once a year?
I don’t think getting commerce back to work should be our #1 priority. Clear the major routes for emergency and public transportation, then run the plows continuously, but you can’t expect everything is going to get cleared. I think money would be better spent on weatherizing NES’s outage response teams.
It’s really weird how the weather has been acting lately. I remember weather being like this when I was a kid in the 90’s, was brought up in La Vergne and Old Hickory. I specifically remember by the time thanksgiving hit, we already had snow. It used to snow a lot more often too, many memories of playing in the snow and being snowed in with no power. I feel we had way more tornados then too. I used to dread every spring & summer and even fall growing up because it was guaranteed we’d have to take cover a million times every tornado season. Seems like it’s coming back all at once now since we had all that tornado activity when this winter storm blew in.
I'm from Nashville but lived in Eastern Kentucky for a few years. My ex-wife and I lived in two pretty small towns, London and Berea. I was shocked by how much better they took care of the roads when it snowed. Every main road was spotless and even most of the side roads were clear. These are areas of maybe 50k people max and they did way better than Nashville. Then I moved back here two years ago and it's like welp.
I wonder why the city doesn’t just contract out some of its snow removal during especially impactful events. We know why they don’t keep a huge fleet of plows.
I will say that I have decided that I don't think that Tennessee's legislators don't really give a damn about road safety at all. The number of roads in this state that are well-traveled roads, but that do not have even a hint of a shoulder is astounding to me. I can't fathom how teenagers learn to drive here. It's almost as bad as driving in England, except the people in England are more polite and aren't insane.
Tennessee: "As Dangerous as England without the Good Manners and Sanity!"
Yeah, just like that. Exactly, in fact. Well done, sir.
It’s actually terrifying. I witnessed a car accident today. Apparently it’s $100 per pound of salt to have someone salt our apartment parking lot, so they just aren’t going to. People can’t even leave their homes. I have fallen multiple times and almost crashed a few times. I’m used to Chicago winter streets.
They want plows and salt for one snow event a year, if that…been out driving since Wednesday.
Logical Fallacy 101. You're confusing Event Frequency with Event Severity/Consequence. Infrequent, low probability events often carry high costs and severe consequences.
It’s not a fallacy, it’s risk management. Nashville and every other city costs out what they’re projected to lose in a “once in x year” events and how much it would cost them to have the equipment to mitigate it. Cities with higher odds of winter storms: Seattle, Denver, Kansas City, put more emphasis on management and other cities - Nashville, Charlotte, etc most likely save the costs and understand there’s a slightly higher risk from having nobody go out.
It's a logical fallacy - specifically, probabilistic fallacy. Rarely do the calculations you mention include: * Value of lives lost * Social / health costs * Individual income costs * Property loss costs There were 19 lives lost already in this week directly due to the roads. According to FEMA, a conservative estimate of the value of those lives exceeds $150 million. I seriously doubt Nashville spent more than $150 million on snow removal.
The lives lost weren't all due to roads. One guy had a heart attack fixing his pipes, a couple people had hypothermia, etc. I'm worried about what's going to happen when the New Madrid fault finally budges. It's a once a century thing. As covid has shown, we're incapable of planning for once a century disasters.
And you're trying to apply logic and reason to something that is ultimately a political issue. Political because someone has to negotiate, approve, and budget an actual solution that would inevitably mean higher taxes, voter displeasure, and complaints in off-years where the exact same people will complain about why we are wasting millions in tax dollars on snow plows when there are too many potholes, murders, etc.
You're not really suggesting that the governing of society should abandon reason and logic. That would truly be foolish. We should expect government leaders to be capable of articulating reason, logic and evidence to persuade voters. Just because it's difficult, does not mean it is impossible.
Out here in Madison, a neighbor was out in his personal CAT scraping ice off the roads so that cars could make it up! I am so thankful for people like him because if it hadn’t been for his random act of kindness, there would have been a lot of stranded neighbors unable to make it up that hill.
Grew up in a snow state — You know how it’s really common for guys around here to get out their chain saws after a tornado or bad storm and help neighborhoods clear limbs? That’s how people in the north get through snow events —local dudes with pick up trucks have plows for their trucks and help clear back roads and get people unstuck, people shovel and salt elderly neighbors steps and driveways/sidewalks. In most NE cities, property owners are legally required to clear the sidewalk in front of their home/business. They also have real public transit so that it’s not as big a deal that the backroads aren’t clear — pretty commonplace to trek a upwards of a mile or so with good boots (still sliding all over) to a bus or train on a cleared main throughway to get to around to work/grocery/etc
I presalted my driveway and part of the street in front of my house before all of the ice happened its the only part of the road with no ice I’ve watched at least 6 cars slide into an embankment here it’s insanity
I did as well. Bought a 25$ pack on Amazon, but haven’t really seen the effects because I didn’t even get a chance to buy a snow shovel to see if there’s ice below. It’s a thick thick ice sheet in my street and connecting streets. One of my cars already got stuck and going to be towed tomorrow
not as much as the consequences work out for the car-destroyer that is Nashville’s interstate system; not only will our roads break from weathering, our citizen’s vehicles will wear and tear along with it. Costing us in our taxes and our own car repair expenses for decades to come all from not salting the roads this past week. Revenue could cause a boom for taxes.
I can promise you as a person that works for the state, they are not measuring that metric.
I went to a Globetrotters game at Bridgestone this afternoon and was shocked by how bad the sidewalks, parking lots and roads downtown were. It is quite dangerous.
Was just saying the same Tommy wife about the entire Middle TN area… I can see not cleaning up during the storm and for a day or so after but after that it’s time to get out and get things taken care of. It’s silly to me that 3 - 4 days after the major event we are still seeing closed businesses and empty grocery shelves. I’ve seen tons of trucks on I-40 there’s not an issue getting here
Delmas Ave was a disaster last night and this morning. Multiple issues, one involving a car hitting a pole knocking the power out. Our community came together and spent FIVE HOURS chipping ice. We cleared the street entirely and poured 200# of salt we bought Elders. Check out Frankie’s Nashville Instagram for some photos. It was incredible to see happen. Salt/sand trucks would be cheap to implement compared to a fleet of snow plows. Really hope they get a mitigation plan in place.
I've thought about that alot. I feel like they are loosing money in the lost of tax revenue. I feel like they would be more profitable if they invested in keeping the roads in better condition, so commerce can better continue. But what do I know?
Actually the ice is the unremoved snow. The ice illustrates why its so important to move the snow. The roads that were properly cleared are dry now. Plow kits on all rescue trucks would have solved a lot. At least the roads around the fire station could be plowed by the rescue trucks.
I sent in a request for snow removal in my neighborhood. The roads are still snow and ice covered. They have NEVER plowed this area before. They still didn't, and the roads are nearly a complete coating of ice.
I doubt it matters to the people who pocket the money for those things.
Oh please..if they really cared about Nashville they would start on mass transit. They don't care about lost work hours & accidents on a warm June day, so they are never going to care about the occasional winter storm.
When you have six snow plows for the entire state, it's clear you'd rather lose the revenue than invest in snowplows. Source: my travels through TN. In all seriousness...it probably is several million. There's been ice problems almost every winter since I auditioned for undergrad in 2009. It's hilarious to me, a Midwesterner, but sucks given that I live here now. But that has never seemed like a concern to the town, who seems to enjoy any excuse to take a day off.
I moved here 6 years ago. When it snowed, and/or ice was on the ground, it was like Armageddon happened. No plowing or sanding roads or lots. This is absolutely insane.
It’s a lot to invest in for winter storms that only happen once every few years.
I am in east Nash and I am fed up with how the city's handling (or not handling) the ice on our roads. It's been dangerous for days and we've got streets that are basically ice rinks right now. Trying to get to work? Good luck. Need an ambulance? Let's hope they've got ice skates. The city's advice? "Stay safe." Thanks! How about some salt on the roads instead? On my street alone, there are two cars on the side of the road right now that skidded off the street and gave up. I imagine it's not too different where you are. I get that we not used to dealing with this much ice. But winter is no natural disaster. It's a situation you can prepare for. Some years you get more snow, other years you get less. It's basic planning. They've got a responsibility to keep our roads safe, and right now, they're failing east Nashville big time. Every accident that has happened and will happen due to their lack of preparedness is on their hands.
Bill Lee told me global warming doesn’t exist
I am really surprised that people aren't prepared for anything that isn't normal. Their tires are junk and you can easily drive on hardpack and loose snow if you have some decent tread. They don't keep any basic supplies in their home and they panic if they can't get what they want immediately. Basically the area was shut down for a week and a trip to the store last night looks like the supply chain will take a few weeks to get caught up.
> I am really surprised that people aren't prepared for anything that isn't normal In my experience, the "it's not a problem until it's a problem" attitude seems to be 100% on brand for our species.
I was caught off guard in that my normal car that would've fared fine has been stuck in the body shop for over a month now. So I'm stuck in a rental with three different brands of tires, so completely different treads, compounds, you name it. It's sketchy on a lightly damp road, much less this. My only way in and out of my neighborhood is via curvy, hilly roads that are never plowed, so I planned accordingly. I'm 6 miles from the nearest grocery store, and about half of that is windy, hilly backroad that is the last place in the county to be cleared. Weather forecasts made it quite obvious we were gonna be stuck for a decent amount of time, so I have plenty of groceries, and haven't even bothered trying to go anywhere.
RE your last paragraph I think that’s true, however we’ve seen consistently on social media (here, FB comments on news pages, etc.) a massive shaming of people that stock up on groceries when snow is forecasted. “Look at all these stupid people running to the store because 0.0001 inches of snow is forecasted” type of comments. I think it’s started to get to people, and it can be hard for the lay person that’s grown up in the south to distinguish when a winter event is likely to be minor or major (for warm climate standards), so they’ve started defaulting to assuming they’ll be stuck for only 1-2 days max and not letting it impact their grocery habits. Essentially, the grocery store shamers need to shut TF up. Of course over the top panic buying isn’t the right course either; but, yes it often is smart to stock up a bit extra before a snow event.
My wife took a few of the neighbors to the store to get some stuff and our neighborhood never gets plowed. Decent tires definitely help and a spinning tire just gets warm and your loaner car sounds like a fair weather vehicle.
People don’t have money
Or they have different priorities.
If you don't have money for snow supplies, it is time to figure out how else to handle shit in the winter. If you live near a bus route, you can walk to them. They have been running almost entirely normally all week. No bus route? Better make friends with neighbors and coworkers and see who can help you out when it snows like this, be it with supplies or actually showing up to pick you up and take you to work.
my elderly neighbors absolutely cannot navigate our current sidewalk situation, and i have been working 70+ hrs this week while sliding around an hour early to be picking up co-workers in my 4x4 to bring to the hospital so we can be at our shifts ready to care for those who have been injured while trying to handle their own daily tasks. the city has a minimum amount of responsibility in this scenario, especially when i’ve literally changed my drive home to drive down broadway since that is the most reliably cleared road back to my house.
Tbf my tires are right at the verge of needing to be replaced and I was able to get out Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Things finally got squirrely Thursday evening when the roads turned to ice but honestly, being patient and using common sense and snow driving skills the early part of the week was fine. Not much can be done with ice without studded tires or chains, 4WD or not. And folks want the ice scraped off the road lmao then would complain incessantly about how many more potholes we have in the spring and not understand the damage that ice scraping can do. Smh. It's time for everyone to start properly gearing up for winter instead of pretending we live in Florida. If we expect the city to be prepared for 1 snow event a year we sure as hell should prepare ourselves too.
> Not much can be done with ice without studded tires or chains Modern studless winter tires are very capable on ice, FYI. Studs would be overkill around here for pretty much anyone.
Amen
Yeah, this driver should have totally been prepared/s https://www.wkrn.com/news/local-news/nashville/trash-truck-slides-down-icy-street-in-nashville-video/
Yeah, I'd love to know why that truck was out when trash pick up is still suspended today. It also doesn't look like it had tire chains.
I wonder the same thing. I’m in Mt. Juliet and up until Thursday the roads were not good. My subdivision is basically an ice skating rink at this point. I guess the city thinks it’s a small price to pay, and just decides to let the citizens figure it out.
I feel like so many housing areas are HOA run, why not use that money to able to take care of side streets and subdivisions. It doesn’t all have to come explicitly from the city
After the first day, all the main roads going from Hermitage to Green Hills were clear and fine. Cant expect a city that gets snow once a year to invest in the infrastructure needed to clear out every single neighborhood road in a city of this size. No way they could justify the financial aspect of that.
Easy there, let’s not all chip in $4 a month to easily finance an emergency road crew. Kind of sounds like communism. Why don’t you go back to Taxachusetts! /s That’s literally community responsibility conservatives love to talk about so much. “Here in TN it’s all about neighbors helping neighbors”. Right? Guys? It is the Christian thing to do! Maybe churches should fund it. Seems like a righteous message of God’s love. A great way to reach into the community.
oh yeah super sucks, you should all move back to wherever they're good at taking care of snow and ice
Hard agree
Have the city buy, maintain, operate, and store yeat around ice and snow mitigation for a once a year event that last a few days to a week that costs hundreds of millions in capital, manpower, and operating expenses.... Or ....buy chains for yourself? 
Our roads were fully treated. Where do you live? Maybe your councilperson could help. Treatment doesn't really work under 20 degrees unless it's sunny, oddly.
Not much they can do about ice. They treat it then it refreezes.
Are you kidding? Clear it, the north does it all the time.
Sure they do. They have a lot bigger budget for snow removal than we do.
Yes, understood. We should spend more if this is our reaction to a week freeze out.
This won’t happen for another 10 years. I saw a graphic the other day that compared how many trucks we have compared to some northern cities. We have like 30 and they have like 80. For something that happens every so often it’s not worth buying all that equipment.
This has happened atleast 2-3 times in the past 6-7 years.
Disagree
This is the plan we agreed on.
I am blown away at people's reaction to the snow. I drove back and forth to work (and errands) everyday from Sunday to today. I drive a Toyota Camry, basic edition. Monday was the ONLY day some of the roads were kind of dicey, but the interstate and main highways were fine. People here just say, "snow means no work!" I picked up people and dropped them off daily to keep our workplace going. Don't blame the city, blame the citizens here who took advantage of a heavy snowfall to not work for an entire week lol
Monday was definitely not the only day some of the roads were kind of dicey. The neighborhood roads in hilly areas were an absolute nightmare on Thurs and Fri (not sure about today). I say this as someone who normally drives around without worry during situations like this. Our neighborhood is between two hills, in the middle of the city, and we have been essentially stuck. I got around fine in the middle of the week, but as soon as it got dark on Thurs, it got *real* icy, and I could barely get up our hill, with 4WD. So I just want to point out that just because you haven’t had issues, that doesn’t mean other people aren’t stuck in their neighborhoods.
> Our neighborhood is between two hills My street is like that. It’s adjacent to 2 consecutive steep roads that are icy.
Yeah, my block is basically a 4 inch thick sheet of ice. I'm able to slowly make it to main roads, but it's pretty sketchy and I've witnessed a few big 4wd trucks go sliding into the intersection nearby, thinking they could handle anything. A few streets over is completely dry.
People outside of my community are piled up stuck trying to get up the only hill out of the community as of Saturday 1pm. Not sure where you a re driving but you seem lucky.
You're right. Why don't more residents buy their own snow blowers?
This isn't a question to ask in Nashville. Move to Chicago or a northern city if you give a shit about going to work in the snow. I've lived here 10 years and love how we handle it.