Town Says Snow Removal Going Slowly

The Town of Brookhaven’s Highway Department said this morning its clearing of the roads is moving slowly, but most major roads remain passable.

Lori Baldassare, the highway department’s deputy superintendent, said the town hasn’t yet gotten to plow some of the cul-de-sacs and secondary roads, but that’s normal for such a storm.

No major incidents have yet been reported from department workers on the road because of the snow, according to Baldassare, though she recommended residents refrain from parking on the streets as much as possible to aid in the snow removal efforts.

“The plowing is going slowly because it just keeps snowing, so they clear the road and then an hour or so later, there’s a few inches on it again,” she said.

The town has more than 500 plows out on the roads today, and the cleanup effort is likely to go “well into tomorrow,” she added.

“It depends when the snow stops,” Baldassare said. “As far as people getting out and around, we should be in much better shape later today.”

Forecasts have predicted the snow will slow down this afternoon, though a winter storm warning for the Island is in effect until the end of the day today.

The National Weather Service in New York issued a special statement this morning for the area from Old Field to East Patchogue, where the weather service said a band of “very heavy snow” could drop 2-4 inches per hour. Another band of heavy snow was moving eastward from Sound Beach to Westhampton this morning, according to the weather service.

Islip's Phil Nolan Chimes in

While the first major snow storm of 2011 dropped less snow on Islip than the post Christmas blizzard two weeks ago, town crews were still faced with a handful of challenges when clearing local streets, which included near whiteout conditions during the overnight hours, Supervisor Phil Nolan told Patch.

“The blizzard was a more elongated storm that presented more challenges overall,” he said. “But our crews during this storm faced some difficult conditions for a couple of hours after 2 a.m. What helped us though was that most of the snow stopped falling (across the township) by 7 a.m.”

Nolan said the town went fully operational around midnight and that crews worked through the overnight hours into the day on Wednesday plowing streets across Islip. At this point, with the streets plowed, he said the next immediate task is salting and sanding roads to provide safe driving conditions.

“We had a lot of melting today with the Sun out, but that water will now freeze overnight,” he explained. “We will have crews out tonight and on Thursday morning (treating the roads) an also cleaning up street corners as well.”

The supervisor reported that Islip had approximately 275 pieces of equipment on the streets clearing the 1,100 miles of roadway that fall under the responsibility of the town.