From Mayor Fuller’s most recent email newsletter…
We made it through the first storm under the City’s new ordinance requiring home owners to shovel the sidewalk in front of their homes within 24 hours of when the snow stops falling. It was a first for residents, and a first for us here at City Hall. Things went well with only one glitch in our handheld computers. Anecdotally, more sidewalks were shoveled and many of us found it more walkable and safer.
We had 261 complaints into the City of Newton 311 system about sidewalks failing to be shoveled 24 hours after the snow stopped last week. City of Newton Engineers, the people who follow up on these complaints, went out to take a photo and issue warnings to the reported addresses. The glitch occurred when a few of those warnings, while entered by the Engineers, didn’t get recorded properly in the software system. This matters because after the first warning, a $50 fine is issued, and then the fine is repeated if the sidewalk remains unshoveled and subsequent complaints are made.
Because of the glitch, we’re giving everyone a pass for the first storm. We’ve fixed the glitch so starting 24 hours after Wednesday’s light snow (i.e., 11 a.m. on Thursday), everything starts from scratch; if a home owner gets a warning for not clearing the sidewalk, it will be considered that property’s first.
Fines are $50 and will be repeated every 24 hours until the sidewalk is cleared. This ordinance applies only to sidewalks that are paved or cement. If the sidewalk in front of your property is grass or gravel, you don’t need to shovel.
Thank you to everyone who shoveled and who helped a neighbor.
The City ordinance (scroll to Sec. 26-8D here) says 24 hours, but the City website says 30 hours for residential and 24 hours for businesses.
This $50 fine every 24 hours until the sidewalk is cleared is a surprise to me. If someone is out of town for a week this could be
costly. On Watertown St there is a corner property which was very icy after the first storm and never cleared. The ice was thick and solid. No way it could be removed. What happens if we get a 2 foot storm and few can handle it. My snow thrower does not remove
heavy wet snow. I can not manage a pull start big snow machine.
The shoveling ordinance has not worked, does not work, and will not work. Sidewalk snow clearing [just like road clearing] is a municipal responsibility. Homeowners and businesses can help. But taxpayers don’t deserve to shoulder this burden that rightfully belongs to the City and can best be addressed by a DPW given proper resources.
@Mike Striar….are you saying you don’t think homeowners should be fined for not following the ordinance? If the city fines people, I think it will have effect on some of the people who don’t follow it.
What is the message this is sending to the people who use 311. Send us your issues and we will dump them?
Sounds like the surveillance state to me. Report on your neighbors to the authorities. Do we need another fine?
Psychologically and emotionally this eliminates the voluntary good neighbor feelings in shovelling your walk and instead makes it a police state mandate.
@Independent Man–
What I’m suggesting is that the ordinance should be done away with, and City Government should do its job. Sidewalk snow clearing should be treated with the same priority as roads, and the City needs to properly fund the effort.
I strongly agree with @Mike Striar, not only because sidewalk maintenance is one of the most basic responsibilities of the municipality, but also because the city’s lazy, irresponsible, and inherently impossible strategy of hoping that 100% of property owners “do the right thing” puts the lives of pedestrians at risk.
Case in point: Beacon Street, where (as usual) about one-third of the sidewalk in the residential stretch between Newton Centre and BC was left untouched last week, particularly wherever the property owner’s main frontage is on a side street (e.g. Hammondswood Rd.) I’m astonished that the entire length of Beacon Street isn’t automatically included on a city sidewalk plowing route, but it turns out that a number of major arteries aren’t considered to be “school routes” and are thus left untouched.
So, good luck to those pedestrians who end up having to walk in the gutter of Beacon Street while cars (and cyclists) whiz down the hill, straightening the curves – especially after the sun goes down at 4:15. Perhaps Mayor Fuller would like to try walking there sometime?
It’s great that the city spends several million on multiple stages of pre-treatment, plowing, and salting of roadways to guarantee safe passage to motorists while sidewalks are somehow excluded from the city’s purview. So, pedestrians unable to walk along impassable sidewalks are supposed to do what? File separate 311 requests for a dozen-plus properties and hope that they get cleaned before the next storm, so we can do it all again? Maybe go knock on doors and plead with the property owners?
The city has implemented a stupid, lazy policy that places an unfair burden on pedestrians, who not only have to deal with the dangerous conditions but are also obligated to report them if they expect any sort of resolution – and the “resolution” isn’t even the clearing of the sidewalk, it’s the issuance of a $50 ticket. Pure nonsense.
Did the city fine itself for not clearing the sidewalk along Langley between Union and Beacon across the street from Sweet Tomatoes??? That stretch was unacceptable. Wasn’t touched and was treacherous!
@Claire,
Of course the City didn’t get fined….there was a “glitch” so you get a new car, and you get a new car and YOU get a new car!
@Mike, I totally agree that city owned property (sidewalks) is the responsibility of the City and not the resident. But, in so many cases, residents do a FAR better job than any City plow would ever do. At least when residents do shovel, they clear to the pavement. Sidewalk plows do nothing but leave deep ruts behind.
And I don’t know about you but I’m often shocked at just how bad a job the plows do on the streets. Shameful in this City…
I wish gravel sidewalks were not exempt. I have a neighbor with a gravel sidewalk on a corner lot. In the past 15 years, both families that lived in that house always dutifully removed the snow. The new neighbors don’t do a thing. And the neighbors across the street also have a gravel sidewalk and don’t remove the snow- so guess what? People have to walk on the street after a big snowfall.
The City should make sure that all residents have proper sidewalks. The City talks a big game about going green, yet we are still inhospitable to pedestrians with homes lacking a sidewalk and then not having to clear a path in the snow.
Mike is right 100%.
MMQC we had a gravel sidewalk and the city paved it. No expense to us. Now if we could just get them to do the driveway 🙂
@Mike Striar…I agree that the city should plow the sidewalks but since they don’t plow my sidewalk I always make sure my sidewalk is clear. My kid walks to school, so I would hope that other homeowners would do the same. As for the fine…if we are fining homeowners for that idiotic leaf blower ordinance then I have no problem with fines for this ordinance too.
Since the car had become the modern day enemy of carbon production and road congestion, why not reduce the cost/effort of pre-treating roads and plowing, instead shift dedication of resources to an army of sidewalk plows forcing people to walk vs drive? And plow just a bike lanes’ worth of road so people will ride their bikes instead of drive?
Sarcasm aside, a real question….
Our neighbor uses a plowing service which often results in a large pile of snow, slush and ice between their driveway and our sidewalk – with some overlap and over spill.
Would that be considered a violation and if so, who gets the ticket?
Matt—yes, that is a violation of the snow dumping ordinance, and carries a hefty fine. The owner of the property with the cleared driveway and the pile of sidewalk snow across or next to it would get the ticket, although for homeowners I think the first violation is a warning.
MMQC, agreed on the gravel comment. I say this each and every year but living on a large corner lot, I shovel all the way around (especially since we are on an unacknowledged elementary school route). The neighbors on one side have a gravel sidewalk so my shoveling leads to nowhere and I see people get mad — at us, strangely — and kick snow back on our sidewalk out of frustration when they have to backtrack. In the other direction, our neighbors are new. They did not shovel last week and I reported them to 311. Not sure if they were notified or not. But I see so many unshoveled walks along Chestnut Street and other major thoroughfares — so dangerous.
Residents, stop reporting violations on your neighbors.
The city voted in the ordinance, it is their task to enforce it.
Newton should not fine homeowners. Instead they should send out city workers to plow the snowy sidewalks. Who is paying for the city engineers to inspect the violators and levy fines?
Just what are our taxes paying city workers to do?
I bet there was no software glitch. I bet the engineers felt betrayed by the administration. Who would want to perform such a thankless mean time consuming fruitless task?
Gee Colleen: I’m confused. I thought you were the spokesperson for the residents of Newton, or at least it seems that way since you’re always telling us how they feel.
Colleen,
While you might want residents to stop reporting other residents, for me, personal safety comes first. I do not want to walk on Chestnut Street or any street because someone didn’t shovel the sidewalk. It puts me at danger for getting hit by a car or a bike. And if I don’t report it, then what? It is okay when a mom pushing a baby stroller gets hit?
Frankly, I am the one walking the street, and while I don’t want to report residents, I will when my safety is at risk.
Everyone on my side of Dickerman Road shoveled their sidewalks, so there was a clear path for walking from Carver Road to Lincoln Street. The vast majority of pedestrians still opted to walk on the plowed and treated roadway because the surface had been uniformly treated by the City.
Colleen, do you expect the City to monitor all the sidewalks throughout the entire City?
At first when I typed that out the idea seemed absurd, but I realized that the City comes around to ticket cars parked on the street overnight all winter, so maybe they could lump it together!
I just don’t like the idea of neighbors snitching on their neighbors, especially when shoveled sidewalks becoming icy are frequently more hazardous than walking in the steeet, or up to certain depth unshoveled sidewalks.
Homeowners who live infront of a bike lane adjacent to their sidewalk:
Does the city plow bike lanes? Does this result in a huge snow moutain on the sidewalk infront of the homeowner? (Ie a huge amount of work compared to other homes)
Would it be fair for the city to be responsible for snow plowing sidewalks adjacent to bike paths?
As a software engineer I recommend to everyone to stop calling things “glitches”.
I work in class 3 medical device software ( robotic surgery, etc.). Software that can cause harm to patients.
We do not have glitches.
They are DEFECTS.
The software is defective.
It should be fixed.
There is no such thing as a “glitch”, and I urge everyone to stop using that term.
You’re welcome.
Bike lane or not, the city tries to clear snow to the curb for drainage and to keep the storm drains open. Road diets, on the other hand, can mean less roadway to clear and smaller snow piles.
As for untended sidewalks, how many of those homeowners manage to clear their driveways?
Several sidewalks around city owned parking lots in Newton Centre are iced over. In those cases, does the city fine itself?
Someone in the know DO tell us when it was the city stopped plowing sidewalks and foisted the chore on us taxpayers. On the eve of a school vacation, or some such, likely. Within memory – i.e. not that long ago :/
In Newton Centre the City is the WORST offender. I get and accept that I need to shovel in front of my house. But sidewalks and crosswalks in the centers when they aren’t in from of homes or businesses, need to be cleared by the City