Snow + 2010 Games = ?

[mr.x]

Is Vancouver prepared handle heavy snowfall during the 2010 Winter Games?

Andrea Macpherson/Lyle Fisher VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) | Sunday, December 28th, 2008 2:35 pm


Snow like this could cause chaos when the world is watching (News1130 photo)


VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) - We are just 14 months away from hosting the world in 2010. But with the recent problems the abnormal snowfall has caused, what can be done should this happen during the games?

Bob Barney with the International Centre for Olympic Studies says the problems with roads, transit, and with airplanes Vancouver has seen lately would be lead to disaster during the games. He says weather has caused Olympic problems in the past.

"This happened in 1980 in Lake Placid. There was a storm, but this is a winter climate, well used to it. An influx of thousands upon thousands of spectators made transportation a real problem around that little town."

But, he says the difference, of course, is New York is used to this kind of winter weather. NDP Olympic Critic Harry Bains says this should be a learning experience.

"Obviously, we're not prepared. The results are quite obvious. You can see it on the street. Two days after snowfall, we're still not prepared to move the traffic around."

Bains would like to a see a transportation committee come together to deal with the potential for heavy snow during 2010.

Acting Vancouver mayor Raymond Louie tells News1130 there is a bright side to getting this huge dump of snow 14 months ahead of the 2010 Games.

"It's given us the opportunity to work out the kinks, to experience what it is like to have a large snowfall and to fix the problems we've identified during this go around with the snow. So I'm sure whether it's the airports or TransLink, or certainly the City of Vancouver, we're making sure we have contingency plans in place."





Are we planning on borrowing a bunch of snow plows and salting trucks from other municipalities in the province, Western Canada, and American states?

There's no doubt that any sort of snow during 2010 would create unimaginable chaos.

[Distill3d]

a better question would be:

how will the Sea to Sky hold up if there is a major snow fall prior to the games?

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by Distill3d

a better question would be:

how will the Sea to Sky hold up if there is a major snow fall prior to the games?

I've never been on the Sea-to-Sky when it's covered with snow.....I mean, it's just one road, it shouldn't be too hard to have salting and plow trucks even as frequent as 15 mins during the 2010 Games if it does happen. The city on the other hand might be a bigger problem.

[Distill3d]

^the Sea to Sky is unstable at best. i'm sure that all this snowfall combined with the warmer temperatures this week will cause at least one rock or land slide along the corridor. a rock slide could take a while to clean up, not to mention the possible rebuilding of the highway. though i'm sure that they have some contingency plan in place for when the occurs.

i do agree though that a once in a decade snow is going to be the worst possible issue during the games.

[sacrifice333]

The Sea to Sky is not a problem (especially if during the Olympics the road is limited to locals and buses). It's one road and there are private contractors keeping it clear.

The lower mainland has been the gong show throughout this white time though and YVR has been even worse.

YVR better put some serious money into deicing capacity in time for 2010 or they're gonna screw our city's image badly.

[Rusty Gull]

^Yes. It seems that among the government or institutional failures during this snow storm, the biggest failure has been YVR/Air Canada.

[johnjimbc]

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but I don't think these nearly unprecedented snowstorms have been the disaster that they have been made out to be in the media. I make this observations as someone who had to drive significantly throughout the metro area during the snows, and as someone who lives downtown and therefore was a pedestrian downtown as well.

Any city tends to take care of main roads first in major snow events, with neighborhood and secondary roads secondary. And, aside from neighborhood streets, I've been very impressed with the amount of snow removal and the speed with which it was taken care of. And downtown anyway, the sidewalks are in relatively good shape as well.

The only real complaint I have at all is that the street plowing downtown created snow mounds at all the intersections, which pedestrians first had to walk over. Then, as the snow began to melt, these mounds blocked drains and created small ponds which pedestrians had to maneuver around or just trudge through, even on main pedestrian streets like Robson and Granville (including South Granville). I wasn't in Kits or Gastown, but I imagine they suffered the same issue. Seems to me there was a glaring gap in taking care of all the snow for pedestrians, and it would be an embarrassment and danger to have hundreds of thousands of people trudging around slushy (or even worse, icy mounds) as they attempted to maneuver around the "vibrant" city during the Olympics.

But as far as the roads went, I think they did fairly well. That does not mean it could be improved. But I have a newsflash. When 60 cm (more or less) of snow falls in about a week, there will be some snow on some streets. With proper tires and traction, most people will do just fine.

I agree the Airport also dropped the ball, with capacity issues - both snow removing capacity and personnel (from what I read) - making the situation worse than it needed to be.

[Canadian Mind]

Originally Posted by Rusty Gull

^Yes. It seems that among the government or institutional failures during this snow storm, the biggest failure has been YVR/Air Canada.

And thats why I'm flying westjet to Toronto tommorow.

[nova9]

I think YVR has done as well as it could but most of the blame goes to air canada. I got relatives out internationally and relatives in via american airlines no problem - come to thikn of it, I had a few friends come in via Air Canada internationally that didn't have many problems.

I'm not sure how much blame we should put on YVR but there are areas I found to be of suspect, I was watching a news report and the VP of Operations said they had a few difficulties given the fact that the air strip vehicles did not have snow tires.

[Distill3d]

Originally Posted by johnjimbc

Any city tends to take care of main roads first in major snow events, with neighborhood and secondary roads secondary. And, aside from neighborhood streets, I've been very impressed with the amount of snow removal and the speed with which it was taken care of. And downtown anyway, the sidewalks are in relatively good shape as well.

The only real complaint I have at all is that the street plowing downtown created snow mounds at all the intersections, which pedestrians first had to walk over. Then, as the snow began to melt, these mounds blocked drains and created small ponds which pedestrians had to maneuver around or just trudge through, even on main pedestrian streets like Robson and Granville (including South Granville). I wasn't in Kits or Gastown, but I imagine they suffered the same issue. Seems to me there was a glaring gap in taking care of all the snow for pedestrians, and it would be an embarrassment and danger to have hundreds of thousands of people trudging around slushy (or even worse, icy mounds) as they attempted to maneuver around the "vibrant" city during the Olympics.

But as far as the roads went, I think they did fairly well. That does not mean it could be improved. But I have a newsflash. When 60 cm (more or less) of snow falls in about a week, there will be some snow on some streets. With proper tires and traction, most people will do just fine.

I agree the Airport also dropped the ball, with capacity issues - both snow removing capacity and personnel (from what I read) - making the situation worse than it needed to be.

Precisely! which is why I raise more concern over the Sea to Sky than the roads in Metro Vancouver. I'm willing to gamble in the next 2 weeks there will be a rock or mudslide due to the accumulated amount precipitation we've had recently.

[Metro-One]

this was more than a 1 in 10 year event, it was closer to a 1 in 40 to 50 year event. 1996 was a big snowfall but it was not as big as this, also it did not last as long. (memory often becomes exaggerated over time). During this event Metro Vancouver recorded its coldest temperature since 1967, 41 years! This caused many problems because our city is not designed around such cold temperatures. This December is only 2cm away from being the snowiest December in Vancouver history. Also this was the snowiest (most snow on the ground) Christmas ever. But i do believe the cities still dropped the ball, in fact everyone did. Just look at the store fronts downtown, almost no one shoveled the walkways. So in the end everyone failed!

[raggedy13]

Barring some freak weather, I can't imagine snow being much of an issue during the Olympics. February is usually significantly more pleasant than December and January. I have pictures from last February taken during Olympics time and the odd person is already wearing a t-shirt. Also, February sees about 2/3 the precipitation of December so we should be getting at least some days of sun during the Olympics. I took note of the weather last February during the Olympic days and overall it was a great couple weeks around Vancouver. I guess we'll have to see how this upcoming February fares to get an even better idea.

Last February 28th:

[mezzanine]

Originally Posted by nova9

I think YVR has done as well as it could but most of the blame goes to air canada.

I ***heartily*** agree - YVR has a few kinks with snow days it could work out, some things would actually improve once the canada line opens, but air canada really screwed things up. My flight to LAS was cancelled 60 min prior to boarding, their 'help' consisted of being on hold for 30 min and dealing with a snarly call centre petty tyrant. Fortunately, wee flew US airways out the same day, but other non-canadian airlines to the US were flying, and westjet, although delayed, were also flying, and not cencelling flights outright. as some who was at the airport trying to fly on Dec 22, the news media did not reflect the seething hatred a lot of us had that day for aircanada.

And air canada is the official airline of 2010!!!

[ryanmaccdn]

If skytrain acts the way it did during 2010 it will be a shit show.....

But I wonder.... I think like 60% of the skytrain problems were with the track switch after Columbia... the one that separates the trains from Expo to the M line.

And I dont understand this... but.... the damn thing sits around 15-20 feet from the Columbia tunnel... Why ohh why can the tunnel or even a tin metal roof extend over it to cover it from the snow.

Maybe throw in some type of heater unit so the damn thing dosnt freeze???

Like WTF

[zivan56]

I don't see this as an issue...we don't get this every year...nor every couple of decades. As long as main roads were cleared and there was at least minimal service (both transit and airport) I would say they did a good job.
I also find it funny that some people went out to buy SUVs to use for maybe 1 day of the year at best. Talk about overreacting

[SpongeG]

Will wild Vancouver weather disrupt games?


Associated Press - December 29, 2008 8:45 PM ET

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) - All of the bad weather that has been hitting Washington state recently has also been dumping on British Columbia - stranding thousands of airline passengers, making roads impassable and causing dozens of power failures.

So the question is being asked north of the border: What if this happens during the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver?

Officials say they're well aware of that threat, and are taking the current storms as a learning opportunity.

At the Vancouver airport, officials say their planning includes anticipating a large snowstorm at the start or end of the games, when travel will be highest.

The airport has ordered extra snow-clearing equipment and is working with airlines to improve the deicing process.

The city's transit system will have more buses and a new subway line that won't be affected by weather because most of it runs underground.

Car-free lanes on roads to the Olympic venues should also mean less chance of snow-related traffic congestion.

And even though they can't control the weather, officials are taking steps to deal with it better. Weather stations have been installed at each venue and along the highway that connects Vancouver to the Whistler ski area.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://www.kndo.com/Global/story.asp?S=9592488&nav=menu484_2_10

[SpongeG]

lol its kind of ironic that SNOW may ruin the WINTER olympics

haha

[wrenegade]

We have had bad snow how many times in the past 15 years? 2? maybe 3 or 4? And it usually happens around the Christmas season, I don't remember it being bad in February (mild weather depicted in those photos seem to be more normal). I don't think we'll have to worry about snow in the city during the games, but don't worry, the traffic will be bad enough.

And honestly, the Sea to Sky highway isn't that bad. The snow removal and sanding/salting is decent. By far the biggest issue is terrible drivers and poorly equipped vehicles. I drive the highway every weekend during the winter and can't remember once in the past 3 years I've had an issue getting stuck. There are many accidents involving people driving too quickly, following too closely, tourists who don't know the road, and obviously cars that shouldn't be on the road in the first place. I am astounded at the lack of RCMP tire checks on that highway. I was stopped 3 times last year, and while it hasn't been bad early season this year, the past week or so has been bad (including Saturday when I came down) and I was not stopped.

Two of these problems will definitely be solved during the games. Number 1, the highway will be closed to public traffic for a significant portion of the games, so there will be far less people on the road. Besides Olympic traffic it will be locals, who I'm sure will be equipped to drive the road. Number 2, even if they aren't equipped, there is no way (just for security purposes alone) the RCMP won't have checks on that highway 24/7.

Back to the snow in Vancouver though, I think one of our biggest issues is when we do get this much, and it sticks around for so long, is we have nowhere to put the damn stuff. It ends up in the curbs, on the sidewalks, in random piles, and it will surely melt and flood the clogged drains/sewers within a couple days. I'm not looking forward to that.

[crazyjoeda]

I have never seen snow like this in Vancouver in my entire life. I think in 1996 we had more snow but it didn't stay on the ground as long.

I haven't seen my lawn in a month!!!