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Calgary's Winter Road Woes (and why my car is perfect). A couple of you might remember the great snow storm we had last week here in this great city of ours. A good couple of inches fell overnight on a Saturday and by Sunday - the streets were a sheet of ice. Naturally, there were no road crews out doing anything to the roads like salt or sand them, so the city fell into a state of ridiculousness. No one could get anywhere without it taking hours, hills were impossible, and to top it off, it was minus stupid cold outside.Now, we live in Calgary. It's not like we have never had snow before and it's not as if no one has ever seen snow before - but one would think that was the case with the state of the city last week. I called the City of Calgary's 311 number to inquire as to if anything could be done to a certain hill close to my office. Naturally, it was a selfish call as it is a ramp that I need to take each day both coming and going to work. The operator asked me for the address and said "Oh, yah so that's Caramacks jurisdiction. The City of Calgary doesn't plow that street. I'll have to transfer you to them..." and without further comment I got transferred to another number. Another operator answers and I give her the address. She replies "Oh - that's the City of Calgary's jurisdiction - you'll have to talk to them". Are you kidding me? So I call back to the City of Calgary and speak to a new operator and give him the lowdown of who I have just talked to. He said "yah well we don't take care of that section of roads but I'll make a note anyways - but for future reference, you'll have to talk to Caramack". Awesome - maybe for future reference ya'll can get your shit in order and figure out who is actually suppose to take responsibility for what. Bah. This made me question the City's operations - who is responsible for what? And why is there no communication within these departments? Oiy. There was a letter to the editor today in the Herald and the chotcho wrote "it should be illegal for any driver to drive on the streets during winter and not have winter tires". I beg your pardon? Illegal? That's taking it a step too far. But then he says this: "If you don't have snow tires, you should keep your car in the garage and just take public transit". And that is the point where I lost it. Seriously. Transit? Are you joking me? You must be joking me. I think we all know how efficient transit is. Now, I haven't purchased snowtires because I don't see the true need for them. The latest quote I got for a set of 4 tires was $712 and that kinda turned me right off. My feeling is that it's the driver's abilities more than the tires (and I'm sure I'll get a lot of opposition on that comment). If the driver is a superstar driver and is patient, cautious and careful driving in the conditions - who needs to spend that much on tires? I can't even tell you how many SUV's had spun out and were in the ditch. As far as I'm concerned, my little car rocks. Posted by Bella at 7:42 AM# 2 Comments: Couldn't agree with you more. Idiot SUV drivers who think because they have 'four wheel drive' that it means the vehicle has ice skates. By Meg, The presale code for the fray is: THEFRAY By
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