MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Winter storm Jonas has taken its toll on municipalities where workers continued clean up Monday.
The National Weather Service reported 21 inches of snow in Morgantown.
Damien Davis, the city Public Works Director, said keeping ahead of the storm was impossible.
“The first part of it was just plowing. We weren’t putting salt down because we’d just plow it right back off. The first part of the storm was just trying to maintain the
roads for emergency vehicles focusing mostly on the main roads.”
At a rate of an inch an hour, Jonas blanketed Morgantown Friday night into Saturday afternoon; it was Monday before the city’s 4 trucks could venture into smaller roadways and neighborhoods.
“Our main roads are pretty good right now. So, we’re focusing on secondary and alley ways and dead ends trying to get those salted,” Davis said on Morgantown AM Monday morning. “We got other crews dedicated trying to get some of the sidewalks unburied, some of the bridges. As soon as we get done with that, we’ll have a fifth crew out dealing with complaints.”
According to Davis, the city’s resources, from workers to equipment, have taken a beating.
“We’ve gone through a lot of chains on tires. We are right now, pretty low on parts. Our mechanics have done a good job all weekend keeping trucks moving. We had four crews going. But, we have six trucks. We had the two spares in case we had a break down we could put a crew in a new truck and get them out there while mechanics could stay back and work on those trucks and get them up and running again,” Davis explained.
The city advised residents with an emergency to call 911 who will notify the city of an expedient need for street clearing.
Friday night, city crews were requested to assist clearing paths to local hospitals for ambulances from Monongalia County and beyond to transport patients.
City leaders, including Mayor Marti Shamberger, were among those Monday thanking drivers for staying off roads at the most dangerous times during winter storm Jonas.
Davis had one more request as workers continued plowing three days after an epic snowfall.
“Don’t dig themselves out into the roadway. Dig themselves out into their yard. We have a lot of areas where we’ve cleaned the road off and we come back and streets’ cleared their cars off and now it’s covered again,” he explained.
Morgantown city code mandates property owners clear sidewalks in front of their homes within 24 hours after a snow storm hits.