On Monday, some streets throughout Pittsburgh remained blanketed by Saturday’s snow, even as city officials claimed “moderate successes” in responding to the winter weather.
Rachel MacMillan expected her road to be left untreated after Pittsburgh’s snowiest day in three years made streets slippery Saturday.
Since moving to Pittsburgh’s Brookline neighborhood in 2020, MacMillan has consistently seen the city struggle to plow and salt roads.
“It’ll get in the news, and then it gets better,” MacMillan, 39, said Monday morning as she stood in inches of snow and ice on Oakridge Street while scraping her car’s windshield. “Then it goes back. I learn to live with it.”
MacMillan lives only a few blocks from the city limits. Once she gets out of Pittsburgh, she pointed out, the suburbs tend to do a better job of clearing roads quickly.
She said she’s frustrated.
“If we have to have our sidewalks done, why can’t we have our roads done?” MacMillan said.
Lulu Kivana, 20, came into Brookline from nearby Mt. Lebanon for work Monday.
“I feel like the city hasn’t done its job,” she said. “It’s a hazard.”
In a statement Monday morning, Pittsburgh Public Works Director Chris Hornstein struck a positive note about the city’s efforts to deal with it called “arduous conditions” caused by the storm.
On the North Side, 6.5 inches of snow fell, according to the National Weather Service. The city said some neighborhoods were covered with up to 9 inches and received double the snowfall that had been forecast. Crews worked around the clock until 6 a.m. Monday, the city said.
“Virtually all streets have been treated,” Hornstein said.
Not in Brookline, though. There, some smaller streets had not seen a plow or salt truck pass through at all.
In Squirrel Hill and Shadyside, most main roads were clear by early Monday afternoon. But some smaller roads, along with portions of Fifth and Forbes avenues, still had snow and slippery spots.
Hornstein said it might take multiple passes to clear a street completely because of the amount of snow and frigid temperatures. The city considers the “vast majority” of streets to be passable, according to Hornstein.
“In some instances,” he said, “it will not be reasonably possible to get a street to bare pavement.”
Councilman Anthony Coghill, D-Beechview, said he thought the city did a “really good job” clearing major roadways. But the smaller streets, he said, were “a solid sheet of ice” Monday morning.
“There’s treacherous roads,” he told TribLive, adding he hoped warmer weather in the forecast later this week would help melt away the hazards.
Coghill said he was hammered with calls from constituents complaining about road conditions. He worried about people trying to navigate untreated roads to get to and from work Monday.
“That’s unacceptable,” he said of the condition of roads throughout his district, which includes Brookline.
Plow woes
Hornstein said the city started with 70 plows — plus 18 more in reserve — when the snow started Saturday. Forty trucks required some sort of maintenance throughout the weekend, though 33 of them have returned to service.
Hornstein said the limited number of trucks available is the “obvious concern” for his crews as they tackle snowy streets.
One truck got stuck in South Side Slopes, he said, and had to be towed. It’s now available again.
There were also a few crashes throughout the city Saturday as drivers struggled. Public safety officials said they did not track how many weather-related wrecks occurred.
Councilwoman Deb Gross, D-Highland Park, said crews prioritized main roads and steeper streets.
“But that maybe was still spotty,” she acknowledged.
Councilwoman Barb Warwick, D-Greenfield, said it was “hairy” when she had to hit the roads Monday after staying home over the weekend.
“It has been very frustrating for our DPW crews and our residents,” Warwick said.
Warwick has proposed raising taxes next year to address budget concerns and ensure there’s more money to invest in rebuilding a decrepit vehicle fleet.
The city’s struggles to treat and plow roads, she said, exemplified why she wants more money for the fleet.
“We just simply do not have the trucks we need to get the snow up off the ground,” Warwick said. “It was a big snow — not a crazy snow — but a big snow. It really highlights the need for Pittsburgh to heavily invest in its fleet so that we can manage weather events like this.”
Back road blues
Abby Crum, 31, was walking her dog Jolene along Brookline Boulevard Monday morning. She pointed out that many local businesses cleared their sidewalks well, but the parking lane along the business district was “a mess.”
“I would’ve liked to see it a little cleaner by now, but I know it’s hard,” she said, acknowledging the neighborhood’s steep terrain makes it tricky for plows to navigate.
Throughout the region, snowfall ranged from four to 15 inches.
Etienne Melton, 42, of Edgewood, had a tough time making it to his job at Amazing Books and Records in Squirrel Hill Monday morning.
While he didn’t think the city did a terrible job with roads, he said it could have been better.
“You practically have to ice skate down a hill,” he joked.
Melton said sidewalks in some spots were icy, putting pedestrians at risk of slipping and falling.
“Back roads, it’s like plows don’t even exist,” he said.
Staff writer Megan Swift contributed to this report.