{"id":18291,"date":"2016-01-25T11:30:57","date_gmt":"2016-01-25T16:30:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=18291"},"modified":"2016-01-25T11:30:37","modified_gmt":"2016-01-25T16:30:37","slug":"road-crews-deserve-heaps-of-praise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=18291","title":{"rendered":"Road crews deserve heaps of praise"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lack of plowing angers many in Coatesville<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

By Mike McGann<\/strong><\/span>, Editor, The Times<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"UTMikeColLogo<\/a>It\u2019s going to take some patience, common sense and, well, a bit of time for life to get back to normal here in Chester County, following an immense snowstorm that dumped two feet or more of snow around the county.<\/span><\/p>\n

Schools and county government are closed Monday, as it has been almost impossible for local road crews to clear the volume of snow from area roadways. From the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) to local municipalities, leaders are asking for patience \u2014 as weary road crews continue to work to clear area roadways.<\/span><\/p>\n

A typical case in point comes from Downingtown Mayor Josh Maxwell, who noted his very hard-working DPW crews couldn\u2019t get the streets of his borough clear Sunday, but not for lack of trying.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI can say with confidence our employees tried hard to get every road in Downingtown plowed today, but unfortunately a few will have to be plowed in the morning,\u201d Maxwell told his followers on Facebook.<\/span><\/p>\n

And if they had trouble on the relatively flat and straight roads of Downingtown with one of the county\u2019s best equipped public works departments, one can only imagine the difficulties being faced in municipalities in the more rural parts of the county, with many miles of winding roads, limited amounts of equipment and manpower. In many of these communities, township and borough workers have worked with next to no sleep, attempting to make roads safe for their residents.<\/span><\/p>\n

The same is true for the county\u2019s school districts \u2014 their building and grounds workers were on the job all weekend, and yet, many had trouble dealing with the sheer volume of snow on school campuses. <\/span><\/p>\n

Between the volume of snow \u2014 plus problems with finding places to put it \u2014 and the issue of snow melt turning to ice in the overnight period into Monday, roads around the county were dicey at best. Between warming temperatures Monday and continued tireless work by road crews, it appeared that much of the county\u2019s roadways would be back in full service by Tuesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

And while it might have been frustrating for those who could not get out and make it to work Monday, local residents should pause for a moment and offer thanks to their local government officials and especially the road crews and public works employees who worked crazy hours over the weekend to try to clear roads and keep everyone safe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Except in Coatesville.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Emergency<\/a>

This street in Coatesville appears to be more typical than atypical, as multiple residents have sent us images showing unplowed or barely plowed streets in the city.<\/p><\/div>\n

Multiple residents of the city have complained to us about the utter lack of plowing of the city\u2019s streets have made parts of the city impassable. Other residents have reached out to us to explain that they cleared their roads themselves with snowblowers, because no city services came to plow.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt looks like the Coatesville administration has abandoned its residents,\u201d resident Tony Buck writes to us, sending a picture of unplowed roadways. \u201cNo road plowed since Friday night, even emergency routes like photo (attached, see left). No one can get to work.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Some suggest that the long-time feud between City Council President Linda Lavender and now former DPW chief Don Wilkenson \u2014 a number of times the two had literal screaming matches during City Council meetings \u2014 has hampered the city\u2019s ability to provide even basic services and worry that things could get worse before they get better this week.<\/span><\/p>\n

Based on the photos sent to us, even main roadways in the city are unplowed and dangerous.<\/span><\/p>\n

Worse, the city\u2019s Web site crashed and appeared to be down, making it even tougher for residents to complain or get information.<\/span><\/p>\n

If true \u2014 and the multiple photos sent to us by residents would seem to confirm it \u2014 something is deeply wrong with the governance of Coatesville.<\/span><\/p>\n

* * *<\/span><\/p>\n

I have to be honest: I hate snow. I didn\u2019t encounter snow personally until I was 5 1\/2, whisked away from my southern California home when my parents began a messy, nasty, multi-year process of splitting up. It literally snowed the first day I came east, Jan. 1, 1970, so I\u2019m the kind of person who takes this weather personally.<\/span><\/p>\n

So then it might not be surprising that I take a certain satisfaction in vanquishing and clearing snow. I am the master of the snow blower, I have a specific plan and technique to clear my longish, hilly driveway so my wife, a dentist, can get out to treat emergencies, even with big accumulations as we\u2019ve seen this past weekend.<\/span><\/p>\n

You can imagine my frustration, then, at being benched right now. On Jan. 6, I had spinal fusion surgery to replace a destroyed (post surgery, it was described as little more than mush) lumbar disc at L5\/S1 \u2014 a problem that left me in profound pain for the last eight months of 2015. Now, I have enough titanium bling screwed into my spine to impress a rapper, and my body is trying to grow new bone to permanently fix the L5\/S1 lumbar together. Oh, and I\u2019m now a 1\/2 inch taller.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not allowed to lift any weights or do anything exceptionally strenuous for a while \u2014 it takes six to 12 weeks for the bone to grow and bond, according to my surgeon, Dr. Kenan Aksu, who performed the surgery for me at Brandywine Hospital. That means \u2014 and he stressed this when I saw him last week \u2014 no snow blower, no shoveling. Period. Strictly enforced by my wife, of course.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, I know for a lot of folks, this would be like getting a \u201cget out of jail free\u201d card. But, to be honest, it kind of drives me nuts. Yes, I have two very strong and healthy teenagers \u2014 both of whom seem to have a handle on the snowblower \u2014 but I\u2019d rather be out there myself.<\/span><\/p>\n

To all of you who have been digging out \u2014 here\u2019s to staying warm and enjoying a nice warm cocoa (or other warming beverage). Spring (and summer) will come \u2014 stay safe and this, too, will pass.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lack of plowing angers many in Coatesville By Mike McGann, Editor, The Times It\u2019s going to take some patience, common sense and, well, a bit of time for life to get back to normal here in Chester County, following an immense snowstorm that dumped two feet or more of snow around the county. Schools and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18289,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,4],"tags":[15,370,7032,3759],"class_list":["post-18291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","category-featured","tag-chester-county","tag-coatesville","tag-road-crews","tag-snow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18291"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18291\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18294,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18291\/revisions\/18294"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}