3,000 miles won’t see Indy snowplows; Public Works calls in contractors to help
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The city will not plow side streets; many of the neighborhood streets in the downtown area and out in the townships will not see a city plow.
Dan Parker, director of the Indianapolis Department of Public Works (DPW), said Tuesday that about 3,000 miles of road in Marion County will not be plowed.
Parker said Public Works crews have been working around the clock. “Like I said yesterday, we were not going to be down to bare pavement today but some streets have gotten down to bare pavement. You are going to see dramatic improvement between now and tomorrow morning when folks head back to work again.”
Public Works called in two private contractors to clear secondary roads at 11 a.m. Tuesday. Parker said they waited to call in extra help until after the snow had stopped.
“Anyone from DPW is not happy until the job is done, and we are going to be here on the job until the job is done,” Parker said.
After a Monday winter storm ended, leaving up to 8 inches of snow in some spots, side streets and neighborhoods were a mess Tuesday.
Sunshine on Tuesday helped get some of the north-south streets cleared, but getting from side streets onto the main roads was nothing short of a challenge for much of Tuesday.
“There is a lot trouble out here on these roads” said Blake Washington, who along with one of his buddies had stopped to help several drivers push stranded cars out on the main road.
Just as they freed one car, another one got stuck.
“Just trying to make life easier during quarantine and this snowfall, helping out people in their time of need, get them out of this snow, getting them out of this weather,” Washington said.
Secondary roads around Fountain Square on Tuesday morning looked as if they had not been touched by a snowplow. Out on the east side, near North Arlington Avenue and 10th Street, the roads had hardly been touched Tuesday morning. All over the city, drivers struggled Tuesday morning to get out of neighborhoods and onto plowed main roads.
“From what I’ve seen, the main roads are clear,” said Jacci Davis, of Indianapolis, on Tuesday.
“The streets are just horrible. … I’m trying to get out. I’m putting my car in ‘reverse’; I’m putting it in ‘drive,’ and I’m scared because people are coming down the streets, so you just don’t know,” said Shawnta Stanford, an Indianapolis driver.
“I got, like, stuck and I had to have like four or five people help me just to pull the car back or forward. Ridiculous,” said Jason Wineke, an Indianapolis driver.
“My car is at home. My supervisor picked me up so we can do this work out here. I would never try to drive on that,” Gayle Gray said.
Jacci Davis and her son smiled as they shoveled a sidewalk. “We are going to spend the afternoon digging out now and having fun while doing it!”
Indy Snow Force has a tool where you can check the status of all streets plowed in the city in real time.