Thursday, January 29, 2009

Snow Plowing Question

I want to see if anyone else is having this issue that lives on the courts. We live on Sweet Bay Ct and it seems it does not get the attention that the Circle or Mt. Laurel does. Our street was not plowed yesterday? Is their a different threshold for the courts in regards to the amount of snow before they are plowed? If anyone else is having this issue I'd be interested to know.

Thanks

Dave

11 comments:

  1. What a cool communication tool. So far able to confirm Magnolia Ct & Black Cherry Ct were not plowed either.

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  2. Basswood was not plowed either

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  3. Here is the answer on the plowing. Thanks David Scaccia for such a fast response!

    Here is Dave's response:

    I just talked to Jason from Mt. Vernon and he told me that as he was in the sub doing some residence accounts he noticed that there was a lot of snow drifts and since there wasn't enough snow per our contract (3") he gave us a freebe yesterday and just did the main drive and entrance for free. The contract says 3" or more and yesterday was about 2 1/2"

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  4. From Christopher Felice re: the contract. This is helpful. Thanks Chris

    The contract that we set up with Mt Vernon Landscaping was to plow whenever there 3 inches or more of snow have fallen. Fyi…most commercial contractors are authorized to plow at 2” or more.



    Additional guidelines include authorizing them to apply salt to the two entrances (and intersections) as required. They have shown good discretion in the use of salt. This is particularly important since the seasonal salt cost can often equal or exceed the plowing cost for the season.



    An additional service they provide us is to clear drifts at a rate of $55 per hr. Usually they can clear the sub of drifts in 1hr, or a max of 2hrs. I think that most will agree that $55 or $110 is a good value for the benefit it provides.



    In a case like yesterday, where less than 3” fell, they don’t plow, but they are still in the sub to apply salt. But since salting only requires a smaller truck (equipped with a plow), they will often clear drifts while they are here.



    When clearing drifts they apparently only make a pass along the big circle (not cul de sacs)--- which may be a capacity issue on the truck.



    For your reference, if they need to completely the plow the sub then they require two additional trucks (both of larger size than the salt truck). The minimum charge for a complete plow is approx $1100- or ten times the cost of two hours of drift clearing.



    Bottom line…. I am sure that Mt Vernon will perform whatever level of service that we direct to perform. But because of our tight budgets (both last year, and this year because of the heavy snow falls) we have kept the current guidelines in place.



    Feel free to discuss with Jason the reasons for the not plowing the cul de sacs, adjustments to the current guidelines, and other options that may be available.

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  5. I've never lived anywhere that the city or county was not responsible for plowing the streets. Why are we paying $1100 every time we have a heavy snow fall(which seems weekly) on top of the taxes we pay(which are also not in line with the current value of our homes)...

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  6. Thanks to Mike Wood for snow blowing the path along Gunn today with his personal snow blower!

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  7. The Oakland County Subdivision Snow Plowing guidelines can be found on the century oaks website now at
    http://www.centuryoakshoa.net/generalinfo

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  8. It appears that in plowing Black Cherry Court the snow plow took out our mailbox located on the opposite side of Century Oaks Circle. How does this best get to their attention for repair? Thanks.

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  9. Dave, The mailbox on Black Cherry Court was knocked out by a county
    plow truck not by the independent people.

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  10. I went by and saw the two mailboxes that were hit. I will get to them today. They did not seem to bad and I believe they can be reassembled. I heard there might be some more that were hit over on the Toll Phase 4 side so I will do a drive around. This is a topic that the board has been addressing. As it stands now, I am going to repair the mailboxes with minor damage. I have done two already and they look pretty good. When Spring comes, we will assess all the boxes (especially the ones repaired over the Winter) and create a detailed repair list.

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  11. Mike - You Rock! You snow plowed the bike path on gunn last week, I saw you up on a ladder changing a light bulb at the entrance a few days ago, and now mail box repair. Thank you for all your efforts on behalf of our sub!

    Dave

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