Vancouverites facing potential fines for not clearing sidewalks
 

I just got a letter for this.
Did anyone else get this? No warnings or whatsoever.


Winter woes return for hundreds of Vancouverites facing potential fines for not clearing sidewalks - British Columbia - CBC News

Did you shovel your sidewalk or is it without merit?

Yea I shoveled before work but I guess there was so much snow it just blanketed the sidewalks again.

That's kind of fucked up then, I would have thought they only went after people who let it pile up and never did anything about it.

yeah I know eh I guess I should fight it then

Is the city low on money or something?

how much was your fine?

The salt wasn't even adequately stocked up and every snow shovel was sold out in every fucking store. Now the city is chasing after people? I don't know how they really assess the sidewalk and what criteria they use to issue fines, but I'm sure there are many in there who are like OP who shoveled in the morning, left for work, and the snow quickly piled up. Man, I won't miss this shit place when I leave.

Maybe it's just me but I always hear the "supplies were sold out" excuse and it's pretty tiring to hear imo.

In terms of the fine, from what I understand (could be wrong) it's a 3 strike system. Something to the effect of Warning, warning, fine. I believe at least 2 of the 3 are done in person as well. Who knows though.

Supplies were sold out = I didn't prepare adequately.

There are 365 days in a year to buy a shovel for "just in case" situations.

This is such a bullshit excuse every year.

"Shovels were sold out!" = Go buy one during spring, summer, and fall?

"City didn't have adequate salt available!" = Same as above. We have several bags of salt available in our storage, because we just pick some up when they're on sale.

People that complain about the stores running out of shovels and salt are just not prepared and are now using that as an excuse. They're most likely the same ones that never shovel their fucking sidewalk so it ends up turning into an ice rink

Also, I doubt most people just started living at their current place of residence. It's not going to be El Nino every year.

Also, people are lucky they're only getting a fine from the city and not a lawsuit against their home insurance policy for someone breaking a hip due to their negligence.

you guys realize there were basically no real snow that stuck on Vancouver streets for two winters straight prior right?

before you say it was in the forecast for few days prior...should've bought salt and shovels then

so it's okay for CoV to drop the ball plow major routes iby morning commuting hours for a snowstorm or 2 but they can come after residents 6 months later?

bylaw enforcement like this should give you a written warning first.

They do give warnings, whether people ignored it calling the City's bluff, threw out the mail or otherwise they didn't go straight to fines.

As for no snow that stuck 2 winters in a row. Are 100% of the population who use the supplies were sold out excuse all new residents to the City, Province, or heck this country for this matter? Or how often are people throwing out shovels? I've been using the same shovels for over 20 years.

Alright Mr. Perfect. The guy is an expert Vancouverite who stocks up salt in warm seasons. Give him a round of applause.

The reality is it isn't unreasonable to expect the stores to carry these supplies when snow hits. Since you had all your supplies, were you even aware of how poorly every store was stocked up? There were no shovels for at least a month in every store :rofl:. Nothing on used market either. If you are working, good luck ever scoring one because you better have a servant lining up for you when they stock up during weekdays. You could get hit with several warnings within a week as you wait for the inventory to be stocked up. Now, people should just borrow their neighbor's when they can't find one, but I understand not every person is willing to approach. It's their fault for not doing so? Sure, but I won't trash them because they didn't.

Purchasing winter tires in October and start putting them on in early November is normal amount of planning. Expecting people to stock up salts in spring and summer? Dude, good luck. Whatever high standard you have there, that simply isn't reflection of the reality and I don't think people should get fined for not stocking up salts months in advance. If the city is so fucking anal about safety, why not start putting a check at intersections to see if every car is equipped with snow tires? Because driving in a severe winter condition in all season / summer tires are way more dangerous and likely to kill more ppl than some idiot fucking slipping on a side walk fracturing his hips :lol.

i think it's silly that you guys are blaming people for not being prepared for this. it's not reasonable to expect others to stock more than a bag or two of salt from the off season. This year you definitely needed a lot more than that, since it snowed and iced over like 3 seperate times.

I think for some a combination of no experience or stupidity depending on who you ask and calling bluff on mother nature hurt people. Oh snow fall they said, yup we've heard that before and it turned out to be Nothing. Even just 3 months earlier we had warnings of the storm of the century coming yet it barely rained. People call bullshit on weather all the time.

As for the in experience or stupidity Man, they need to do shoveling and salting 101 at the beginning of every winter. It's crazy how I see some people wait too long to shovel when the bottom has already iced over or how people just throw like half a bag on the sidewalk or even worse unshovelled snow as if salt was some magically substance that would just wipe it all away.

If anything I really hope this last winter was a wake up call and that people at least gained a little knowledge

It is unreasonable. For the years it does not snow the salt just takes up space costing stores money. For 2 plus years we had about 20 bags of salt that where kept in a shed. Snow hits we sell all of them in less then 2 days. Making $100 after storing it for 2 plus years is not a great return on investment.

You live in Canada, guess what it does a fair bit of? SNOW! If you have enough space for a lawn mower or shit in a 5000sqft Richmond China-box, you damn well have enough room to buy ONE shovel and a bag of salt.

Jesus Christ you people are dumb. You are the kind of person who goes camping and doesn't bring newspaper to light the fire, or only bring a hatchet

there was no fine. I got summoned to show up in court in August.
fucked up.
nobody got time for that.

The reality is you live in fucking Canada, don't blame the stores because you were too stupid to realize that in the winter it can snow. Is it really that hard to keep a dinky little shovel tucked in a closet? You say they were poorly stocked up yet they had shovels and you didn't, take some responsibility for your own failures and be better prepared in the future.

Not being prepared and not understanding the consequences is not an excuse. If no one could get salt or shovels, I'd be on your side. But enough people were able to prepare that those who didn't are the ones to blame. Take it as a lesson learned about taking responsibility and being proactive for life, not reactive to already ongoing situations.

If it was January and you needed to drive the coquihalla tonight and you couldn't get snow tires put on today, and drove off the road on summer tires, would that be the governments fault, the tire shops fault, or your own fault?

Granted everyone's situation is different so I won't paint everyone with the same brush. With that said, I personally don't find it unreasonable for anyone who owns a single family home to have room to store 1 shovel and at least 1 bag of salt. I can honestly say that with my father in law and I timely shoveling that we were able to keep our sidewalk, walkways, and driveway very clear all winter and used less than the 1 bag of 10lb salt we had. In fact I think we used half a bag at most.

Again, everyone is different. Some new to the country and just don't know what winter is, some old and incapable with no help, some lazy, and some just dumb.

Some people will need to learn from this and quite frankly some people will need to own up for being called out and those people know who they are. Talking about this makes my blood boil that my neighbour a very capable couple in their 40s refused to shovel their sidewalks and only shoveled their own driveway which connects to the street only when it was convienent because they needed to go out for a christmas party. Of course then they shoveled only just enough for their car to get out. While their father who still lives there, old as fuck was shovelling every year with some help from my mother in law but was unable to this year because of a medical issue. God I hope they got fined.

"you live in Canada"

so do we all live in igloos here or did some of us forget that we live in a temperate rainforest here in Vancouver, where it snows "seriously" about every 10 years?

Winston: 1 bag of salt is gone after the second day. my business used like 20 bags of salt and it wasn't enough, we ran out too. we usually stock about 5 bags and that's enough. if it's not, we can normally just go to Walmart and buy 5 more in the middle of winter. this year was different.

Lol, look how you managed to become a little annoying whiny shit rat. Direct your hatred towards all the immigrants the country is taking, or accept these people because no one comes to this city with the mildest weather in the country prepared for a fucking snowstorm. Get prepared for things to get worse because of all the more immigrants the city is accepting. Learn to accept human nature and lower your expectation. People still can't fucking drive in the rain in this city year after year and you expect every household to have salts stocked up for a major snowstorm? If this pisses you off, boy you should consider leaving.

To those who are saying not being prepared is not an excuse, I'd say adjust your fucking expectation. The housing market in the city is one of the most active in the country, so there are tons of new home buyers. If you go nuts over these people who failed to stock up salt months in advance, I feel sorry for your life because I don't know how many other things drive you mental every fucking day.