City needs help with street snow

Columbia Falls police chief Dave Perry is asking for residents to help city crews to clear remaining snow on city streets by removing cars, trucks, RVs, trailers, boats or whatever from city streets.

“We need to widen traffic routes for safety reasons,” he said.

Last week’s big snowfall has created difficulties all across town, as public and private plow crews work to remove deep piles of snow. He said fire trucks might not be able to maneuver through the narrow traffic routes to respond to an emergency.

Perry explained that in 1996, when record amounts of snow fell in the Flathead, traffic routes on city streets got progressively narrower as more and more snow fell and city crews were unable to pile it any higher.

“Then the big snow berms froze solid and were very difficult to remove,” he said.

Perry noted that city code limits how long residents can park vehicles or anything else on city streets to seven consecutive 24-hour periods.

Columbia Falls fire chief Rick Hagen reminds city residents to shovel snow away from fire hydrants near their homes.

“We have more than 300 hydrants in Columbia Falls, and city street crews could never keep all of them clear of snow,” he said.