When warmer temperatures come back, so will Edmonton's residential parking ban

Snow plows will return to Edmonton neighbourhoods on Monday, as will a parking ban to ensure they have room to work. 

Snow clearing was paused Dec. 31 because of the extreme cold. 

When crews hit the streets again on Jan. 10, temperatures are expected to be above -10 C. 

"When we see those extreme weather conditions, it is extremely hard on our equipment and our staff to get those areas down to bare pavement," Andrew Grant, the city's supervisor of infrastructure operations, said Thursday. 

"We're dealing with the weather conditions as they get thrown at us, and we'll continue to do so." 

Grant expects residential clearing will take four weeks, which will also allow time for crews to go over neighbourhoods that were cleaned before Edmonton's most recent snowfall. 

Before the deep freeze, crews had begun blading residential areas for the first time. 

"Where we'll really see the benefit of going down to pavement in the residentials is in the spring melt season; we'll avoid seeing rutting," Grant explained. 

Starting Monday, crews will also be picking up windrows at the property entrances and in the middle of roadways outside neighbourhoods. 

Crews will be out, and the parking ban in effect, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. 

The ban will be enforced, Grant warned. 

"[Officers will] be working closely with operational teams to identify those areas that are not compliant and provide real problems from a safety perspective to get our equipment down there," he told media, asking the public to watch for parking ban signs at the entrances of their neighbourhood or to check the city's snow-clearing status map for schedules. 

"It definitely takes a community effort to deliver an efficient snow clearing program, and we ask residents to please not park on the roadways to allow our equipment to get through those residential areas."

Snow clearing was not stopped over the start of the new year on top-priority roads.