Thinking ahead about winter weather

By Sam Adams

Chained up for winter!Today, the City of Portland Bureau of Transportation Maintenance is conducting its final exercise in a series of annual winter preparedness exercises. We are chaining up our trucks and sending them out on their routes to ensure that the City is prepared to respond to winter snow and ice events.

Transportation Maintenance is designated as the lead response agency for six of the thirteen types of emergency or disaster events named in the City’s Basic Emergency Operations Plan, and provides substantial operational and logistical support to the response in virtually every disaster type. The six are Landslide, Extreme Weather, Snow and Ice, Water Flood, Volcano, and Levee Failure.

Every year we conduct this snow and ice dry run event to ensure that employees have been properly trained and equipment has been properly serviced, inspected, and tested to be ready for an event. Today is our final exercise in a series of classroom and hands-on training for field employees and tabletop exercise sessions for employees with incident management roles.

The dry run involves chaining up the vehicles, equipping sanders andWinter weather is around the corner. plows, and running each vehicle through an inspection checkpoint. Our employees are prepared to do their job. They know their equipment and their routes, they are prepared to quickly assess the condition of our streets, and they are ready to apply their skills to keep our emergency response routes open and our community safe. Today’s event and the recent rain and wind storm an early advisory to Portland residents to begin to prepare for winter weather conditions.

Neighborhood by neighborhood, we need to join together to prepare for the winter hazards we might face. Essential equipment for property owners is a snow shovel, de-icing granules (available at home improvement stores), and traction devices for their automobiles. We recommend everyone carry chains in their vehicle to be prepared. Our goal is to make our emergency response as effective as possible to minimize threats to public health, safety, and property – and enable people to get where they need to go.

The recent rain and wind storm reminds everyone that following a major weather event, or other major disaster, the City relies on the skills of our real first responders, the community. The last couple weeks, we relied on residents to clear catch basins of leaves and debris near their property while Transportation Maintenance crews worked around the clock to clean streets, clear trash racks in the hills, and clear clogged catch basins on highest priority transportation facilities. As a result, no road closures were declared due to standing water.

In winter storm events, we recommend all Portlanders stay tuned to local weather forecasts to monitor the event and plan accordingly. Take transit to get around the city. If you must drive, consider delaying your trip until road conditions are better. Give yourself extra time to get to your destination. And please drive slowly, leaving plenty of room to stop safely.

Safety is my number one concern.