The Observation Deck

The city of Lakewood is placing a SNOW BAN in effect at 10:30am, and the order has gone out to start towing cars.

Athens Avenue (Carabel to Lincoln)
Belle Avenue (Madison to Lake)
Berea Road (Horseshoe Bridge to W. 117th)
Bunts Road (Lakewood Heights Boulevard to Clifton Boulevard)
Clifton Boulevard (Webb to W. 117th)
Delaware Avenue (McKinely to Brown)
Detroit Avenue (Gridley to W. 117th)
Lake Avenue (Webb to W. 117th)
Lakewood Heights Boulevard (Woodward to Horseshoe Bridge)
Madison Avenue (Riverside to W. 117th)
Riverside Drive (Sloane to Fischer)
W. 117th Street (Berea to Edgewater)
Warren Road (Lakewood Heights Boulevard to Clifton Boulevard)

The process will start east and move west, get those cars off the street!

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Or, depending on local conditions, start looking for your car, so you have time to find it as well as move it.

Lakewood City Hall, destroying our brand one day at a time.



Old Lakewood resident, that remembers Lakewood had the cleanest streets in the county.

Today, City Hall gambled everything on a couple friend's dreams from the 90s, and lost, yet again.

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Can anyone enlighten me about the history of this snow ban? As I've mentioned, I've lived on the same street in lakewood for almost 20 years. I don't recall being told my car would be towed at any other time (this is my recollection - it's possible I just didn't know AND didn't end up getting the car towed).

How can such a ban work in our city? The driveways are inadequate and often serve two different households as we all know all too well.

So, in addition to an extreme reduction in the quality of street clearing, there is an additional burden placed on the citizens to dig their cars out right away and move them to God knows where to park.

todd vainisi wrote:Can anyone enlighten me about the history of this snow ban? As I've mentioned, I've lived on the same street in lakewood for almost 20 years. I don't recall being told my car would be towed at any other time (this is my recollection - it's possible I just didn't know AND didn't end up getting the car towed).

How can such a ban work in our city? The driveways are inadequate and often serve two different households as well all know all too well.

So, in addition to an extreme reduction in the quality of street clearing, there is an additional burden placed on the citizens to dig their cars out right away and move them to God knows where to park.

Todd

I added a list of the streets back in the original post.

Sorry for any confusion.

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Todd

I added a list of the streets back in the original post.

Sorry for any confusion.

Ahh, that explains it! Well, it was good idea to free my truck from the snow bank anyway!

Towing multiple vehicles on West Clifton. The cops were very nice and tried to contact owners.

West Clifton has parking on both sides of street, which can make it difficult.

Other streets, parking is only on one side. Why not: Plow the nonparking side TODAY, let everybody move their cars to that side tonight; then plow the normal parking side TOMORROW.

And if city HAS to tow cars - just tow them to the cleared side of the street.


City started doing this with leaf collection - which is a much smaller issue than snow clearing.

Also - noticed for the first time EVER, today -

a small bulldozer with snowplow on front - clearing sidewalks on south side of Hilliard, near Elmwood or thereabouts.

Why not do more of this - Riverside gets totally blasted by the huge ODOT trucks throwing the heavy road snow onto the sidewalks.

It is NOT possible for any human being to undo this damage and keep up a clear walkway.

todd vainisi wrote:Can anyone enlighten me about the history of this snow ban? As I've mentioned, I've lived on the same street in lakewood for almost 20 years. I don't recall being told my car would be towed at any other time (this is my recollection - it's possible I just didn't know AND didn't end up getting the car towed).

How can such a ban work in our city? The driveways are inadequate and often serve two different households as we all know all too well.

So, in addition to an extreme reduction in the quality of street clearing, there is an additional burden placed on the citizens to dig their cars out right away and move them to God knows where to park.

Hi Todd et al,

I cannot tell you the beginnings of snow bans in Lakewood but I can support ideas appearing in this thread.
1. Lakewood streets used to be the cleanest in the land. You would give a huge sign of relief when you made it back to Lakewood because the snow and Ice were taken care of and you knew you were safe.
2. There is NO PLACE for many of us to park. You are correct, driveways and side streets are inadequate for the numbers of cars. It is a veritable nightmare some evenings when I get home late. A few years ago, I parked right next to my house at 3am after staying for hours with my ill Mother in a nursing home. However, I parked at the ONLY spot available (and I mean ONLY spot within a mile) on that very cold and snowy winter night and I was too close to the end of the street. I garnered a ticket as a result and when I talked to a Lakewood policeman the next morning (Explaining WHY I had to park where I did), the officer, who was expediting the towing of a hapless neighbor who was out on Clifton Blvd at 7am replied in a most patronizing tone " You should have know this when you moved here!". I still wish I had gotten his name and badge number. Usually, the police here are pretty polite. The POINT: There is inadequate parking in Lakewood and it is really unfair to issue bans when people have nowhere to go.
3. There has to be a better way to plow without leaving a 3-4 foot pile beside & in front etc of cars on the street, forcing people to spend an hour or many times longer trying to dig out. There is definitely a way to execute a plow without surrounding cars with virtual walls of snow. It has not always been this bad and I grew up here and have lived 2/3rds of my life her (and I am "older"- Ha!)

I hope they can fix this.

So far as I can recall, snow parking bans have existed in Lakewood and many, if not all other communities from the time we arrived in Lakewood in the 1950's. Some communities enforce those bans with greater aggression than others. I know of one nearby suburb where you do not DARE leave your car on the street, if it snows more than a few inches.

The thing is, for a number of years now, our winters have been relatively light, so that's why you probably haven't noticed this sort of enforcement lately.

For that matter, I seem to recall some sort of ordinance that says you can't keep a car on the street in the same place for more than a day, regardless of the season. Perhaps someone could look that one up?

With close to a foot of snow fallen last night, and another significant round expected this evening, I would think- and even expect for the tow trucks to be out. I passed a number of cars today in Lakewood that, quite frankly, should have been dug out and moved by this afternoon, at least.

This is an exceptional weather week, and people will simply have to make arrangements for their cars, in order for the plows to do their jobs. Perhaps if they do not have their own driveway parking, they might be able to share a neighbor's drive temporarily?

Regarding plows, at least one neighboring community uses a number of small plows for their municipal sidewalks. I would think that more of those would serve Lakewood well.

Back to the banjo/shovel.