Snow piles, cancellations – and good deeds

Driving winds and a heavy dump of snow made for slow going on Harold Street in Roxbury Sunday. The storm dropped more than a foot of snow on Boston, as the city struggles to clear streets and sidewalks after a record three weeks of snowfall. (Photo: Clennon King photo)

After multiple storms piled more than 90 inches of snow on Boston from mid-January to mid-February — and with more snow expected this week — the city is a mess, with clogged streets and sidewalks, drift-buried cars, countless cancellations, tempers wearing thin and few places to put snow even where shovels and plows attempted to keep up.

As of Monday afternoon, seven “snow farms” around Boston — large vacant lots that hold the snow removed by plows from city streets — had received 16,000 truckloads totaling 320,000 cubic yards. Huge snow-melters, some borrowed from other cities, had liquefied 40,000 tons of snow. Over the weekend, the Massachusetts National Guard, already assisting around the state, sent 10 guardsmen and five Bobcat vehicles onto Boston streets.

Nearly 3,000 citations had been issued for snow violations, according to Bonnie McGilpin, Mayor Martin Walsh’s press secretary.

At a press conference on February 16, a day municipal offices were technically closed for the President’s Day holiday, Walsh looked a bit weary of talking about snow yet again, but began by highlighting the positive in storm behavior.

“The residents of the city of Boston are very special,” he said. “Watching everybody help each other has been great.” The mayor himself had stopped the day before to help a driver jumpstart his car near City Hall, he said.

Staffing a Mayor’s Office hotline over the weekend, he said he took calls from people who thanked city workers for the job they’ve been doing. Others called about fire hydrants covered in snow and — not surprisingly — about streets that needed plowing.

“If you’ve already reported your street, it’s in the system. We can’t get to all of them at once,” he said.

The new normal

The unprecedented succession of major snowstorms has left mountainous snow piles on street corners all over the city, forcing pedestrians to step outside crosswalks, veer into streets, or climb up and over the massive mounds to reach the sidewalk or street. Yet, after numerous days of overwhelmed services and closed businesses, city officials hope the city is staggering to its feet.

“Tomorrow is a normal working day,” Walsh said Monday, though some of the details that followed sounded anything but normal: city agencies would be checking roofs to try to prevent collapses; the School Department was canceling events even during February break week; it was still uncertain whether the MBTA would run a weekday schedule. Later on Monday, the MBTA announced continuing limited service, especially on rail lines, saying it could take 30 days for full service to resume.

BPS, already struggling to maintain classroom continuity in the face of seven snow days in two weeks (in addition to an early January closure due to bitter cold) has canceled many programs for the week, including an “Acceleration Academy” at 20 schools around the city that would have served about 1,500 struggling students with intensive work in English Language Arts. While this vacation week program won’t be made up, another session, focused on math, is scheduled for the April break, McGilpin said.

In the Monday press conference, Walsh called for patience and urged sensible behavior. He cautioned parents to watch their children closely on snow banks and around snow removal vehicles; asked drivers to lay off the horns when stuck on blocked streets; and expressed alarm at reports that young adults were jumping out of windows into snow.

“Stop the nonsense. You could kill yourself,” the mayor said.

Good deeds

Though the Boston Globe has reported incidents of slashed tires on cars parked in spots previously marked with makeshift space savers, snow-frayed nerves have not caused an uptick in reported assaults, according to Police Commissioner William Evans. In the press conference, Evans called people’s behavior, in general, “very respectful of each other.”

Evans and his BPD officers have driven hospital workers to their jobs during periods when the MBTA shut down service altogether.

District 7 City Councilor Tito Jackson saw a need the evening of Feb. 9, when the T halted at 7 p.m., stranding some workers, students and commuters who arrived at subway stations unaware.

Finishing a meal at a diner near South Station, Jackson heard a chef mention that he didn’t know how he would get home without the T. After offering him a lift home, Jackson posted on Facebook that he and his Prius were ready, willing and able to take people where they needed to go.

“After dropping the first man off, I went to Jackson Square,” said Jackson in a phone interview. “I walked in, let everyone know I was a city councilor and was offering rides. Got my first carload of people there. Then went on to Dudley.”

From about 7 p.m. to midnight, Jackson shuttled about 35 people, he said. Some were workers or students going home, to Roxbury, Ashmont, Mattapan and other neighborhoods. He dropped a nurse off at Tufts Medical Center. Several of his rides were immortalized in “selfies” taken by Jackson and posted on Facebook, where he clearly moved many followers who posted blessings and cheers. One wrote, “This man is living proof that angels walk among us!”

Back to business, Jackson said his office has been receiving about 30 or 40 snow-related calls every day, most asking for side streets to be plowed or reporting property owners who haven’t cleared their walkways.

He has also seen and heard of good deeds going on all over his district.

“A lot of folks are being kind to one another, helping each other shovel out,” he said, “doing things for seniors and other people who need extra help.”

A full-scale snow removal effort went into operation in Boston on Monday evening, beginning at 6 p.m. instead of the usual midnight start, in an attempted to restore the city to business as usual. McGilpin indicated that the city’s Public Works Department is “doing its best” to respond to all snow bank concerns reported through Citizens Connect and the Mayor’s Hotline, and reminded that property owners are responsible for clearing snow on their property.