18 Plows Took On 120 Miles, 376 Streets In Upper Merion

Bill Jenaway, the Chair of the Board of Supervisors for Upper Merion Township, shared the following note updating residents of the area on storm recovery:

“This past weekend’s storm was literally a beast, to all of us. The inconvenience Mother Nature provided affected every one of us in one aspect or another. So while the members of the Board of Supervisors and the Staff regret any extended inconvenience, remember this storm was one for the record books. This storm presented several challenges, specifically 26.1 inches of snow accumulation – long duration and severe drifting.

That created unforeseen and never before experienced challenges.

The Public Works crews worked around the clock from 8:00 PM Friday night to 4:00 PM Monday afternoon.

In addition to the township’s 14 plow and salt trucks, we had 4 contractor plow trucks and 2 contractor front end loaders working on 120 miles of township roads (376 streets), as well as state trucks on state highways.

Remember the priority for plowing is primary streets, followed by collector streets, followed by residential streets, followed by cul-de-sacs and dead ends.

This enables the most flow in a systematic manner, but may unfortunately cause delays for others.

Personally, I had the same challenges as everyone else and I live on a private street and we have a private contractor plow for us.

The challenges were the same, too much snow and no place to put it.

I was able to be out yesterday morning and found that while some streets indeed had a lot of work to do, many were opened and people were moving.

In addition, while there are some reports of other communities being better off than us, that is not what I saw in neighboring communities I travelled through.

For those with concerns, constructive criticism is important and welcomed.

As is done with each significant event in the township, we will be evaluating the Public Work’s Department’s performance with this storm and will take whatever steps are necessary to improve said performance.

Thank you for your patience, as we continue to clean up and widen some of our narrow roadways. This will be an ongoing process that will take a few more days.”