News Releases

Administration briefed City Council late this afternoon about the plans for clearing snow on residential roads, resulting from the severe storm that brought an incredible 30 to 40 cm of snow in Saskatoon over the weekend. The plan for snow clearing was presented to all City Council members.  

“With just a few Priority streets remaining to be cleared, we can now focus our efforts on residential streets.  We’re coming to residential streets, and it’s our objective to restore mobility to key streets in every neighbourhood, city wide, in the next nine days or less,” says Jeff Jorgenson, City Manager. “Every day since the snowfall beginning on November 7, our crews have been working around the clock, making progress day and night, and we’ve now hired additional contractors to help us get to you as fast as possible.” 

As of today, we have 260 road crew members rotating 12 hour shifts, operating approximately 125 pieces of equipment, including plows, graders, sanders and sidewalk equipment. Today, clearing started on residential streets in Kensington and streets within Stonebridge are being cleared this evening and throughout the night. Tomorrow, crews will move to key streets within Rosewood, Evergreen, Brighton, Erindale, Arbor Creek, Hampton Village, Montgomery.  

“Extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary measures, so the residential snow clearing schedule continues to evolve as we bring more and more contractors on board,” says Jorgenson. “We will be working simultaneously throughout the entire City, focused on beginning with the streets worst affected and clearing residential streets in all neighborhoods in a sequence where the streets carrying the most traffic, or are strategically located, are addressed first.” 

After the initial pass through, crews will then go back to clear any remaining streets and following that, will start the process of loading and hauling away the snow ridges in front of homes.   

“This effort will be a snow removal operation never before seen in our City,” Jorgenson adds. “This approach will provide the most mobility, most quickly, throughout the City.” 

Residents are not required to move their vehicle, but if able, crews will appreciate more space to complete the work and the ability to clear streets more fully.  

Back lanes will also be prioritized along with the residential snow clearing.  

“In my lifetime, I’ve yet to see a year like 2020, presenting our City with these significant challenges,” says Jorgenson. “Helping each other out, lending a hand to those in need, and seeking creative solutions will lead to great innovation and bring us out on the other side.”  

More information on our process for snow clearing will be updated mid-day tomorrow, including a schedule for the first nine days of residential snow clearing. This information can be found at saskatoon.ca/snow 

School Zone Snow Removal  

Crews are planning to remove piles of snow left by graders (windrows) from all school zones next week. This will provide space for vehicles parking or dropping off and picking up children.   

Saskatoon Transit  

Transit has resumed modified service on all routes. Detours and adjustments are needed on some routes due to road conditions and normal routing will resume as streets are cleared. Access Transit continues to provide essential trips only where road conditions permit.  

Transit users should consult the real-time app Transit or Google Maps Transit on desktop or SaskatoonTransit.ca for route information and service alerts.  

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In the wake of a severe winter storm that covered Saskatoon, the City has immediately taken steps to clear snow from residential streets. 

“We’re hearing from all our residents, and we recognized from the moment we saw just how much snow we were dealing with, that residential roads would be a challenge,” says Terry Schmidt, General Manager of Transportation and Construction. “We need to fix the problem and get everyone moving around again.” 
 
Under normal winter snowfall circumstances, the City’s snow clearing service does not extend to residential neighbourhoods, but this is an unusually large amount of snow all at once for Saskatoon. 
 
“Last winter, the city had five snow events that roughly equated to the same snowfall we experienced this weekend,” Schmidt says. “This is an incredible challenge; we are doing everything we can to get Saskatoon back to a daily routine.” 

For this reason, the City is acting with a plan to restore mobility on all roads city-wide, including residential streets, because of the challenges people are facing, like getting to work and going about their daily lives.  

Over the weekend, Saskatoon experienced a severe winter storm with between 30 and 40 cm of snow and high winds which created large drifts across the City. Underneath the snow is a layer of ice from the freezing rain that also fell. 

What’s been done 

The focus since Monday has been to restore mobility along the priority streets.  All priority 1 streets have had drifting removed and many have now been graded curb-to-curb.  Nearly all Priority 2 streets and 85% of Priority 3 streets are passable. 

With the layer of ice under the snow, streets remain slippery.  It will take several more days to clear the priority streets curb-to-curb and fully complete sanding and de-icing.   
 
Last night, graders continued to make progress in Riversdale, Broadway, Erindale, Evergreen, Briarwood, Wildwood and Stonebridge.   

What to expect 

Today, city graders and contractor graders are working together on the east side of the City to finish making Priority 3 streets passable in Stonebridge, Rosewood, Wildwood, College Park, Brighton, Willowgrove, Forest Grove and Sutherland. 

Graders will also be returning to priority streets to complete curb-to-curb clearing.  We will continue to work around-the-clock on priority streets with a full contingent of roadways staff and contractors until cleanup is complete.  

Schmidt says aside from cleaning up from the blizzard, the other focus for today is responding to the snow we are already receiving. 

Residential streets 

Schmidt stresses attention is turning to residential snow clearing immediately. The work was scheduled to start this morning with a crew being mobilized to the Kensington neighbourhood.   

“Crews are making very good progress on clearing priority roads,” he says. “As those crews become available after completing this work, further resources will be assigned to restoring mobility on residential streets.  

It’s anticipated additional crews will be able to start work on other neighborhoods on Thursday, November 12.  

“The plan is to put as many resources as possible in as many neighbourhoods as possible all at the same time across the City.  This work will be done night and day, in all neighbourhoods. 
 
“We understand night work may cause some noise and inconvenience but working through the night will greatly reduce the schedule to complete the work,” Schmidt says. 
 
Normally, and for the past few days, the City has encouraged residents to contact us with specific concerns, but the approach is shifting and with this plan we are addressing all areas in our city. 

However, Schmidt points out that while attending to residential streets -- and with the snow we are receiving today and possible future snow -- we may need to go back to prioritizing higher traffic streets for a time. 

Please remember road conditions are still considered dangerous due to snow accumulation, ocassional drifting, and the layer of ice underneath the snow.  

As another reminder, we ask citizens not to push snow out onto the street when clearing snow from sidewalks and driveways -- this can clog up streets with snow and create further mobility issues. 

Once again, the City extends its thanks to everyone helping neighbours, remaining patient during the city-wide snow clean-up, and for staying safe around the snow removal equipment on our streets. 

More information on our process for snow clearing can be found at saskatoon.ca/snow 

School Zone Snow Removal  

Crews are planning to remove piles of snow left by graders (windrows) from all school zones next week. This will provide space for vehicles parking or dropping off and picking up children.   

City Hall  

Where possible, residents are asked to use available online services at saskatoon.ca. For property taxes, assessment, and utility related matters, they can contact the City by e-mail at revenue@saskatoon.ca or phone at 306-975-2400.