While the Thanksgiving break lasted a few hours longer for students, for others, holiday lounging ended early with cold temperatures and physical labor.
Snow removal started shortly after the storm began over the weekend and is still going on. Forecasts hint at more of the white stuff later on this week.
“It’s an ongoing battle, we’ve got people working around the clock,” said John Neumann, Department of Transportation supervisor. His department is responsible for clearing the roads and parking lots.
“The amount of snow and amount of moisture in snow made it more difficult to hand shovel and plow,” said Pete van der Have, director of plant operations.
On Sunday, plows hit all parking lots twice, but the real struggle came when drivers arrived on campus.
“It’s not so hard to plow, it’s mainly if the lots are free of cars,” Neumann said. As a result, much of the work must be done during off hours, for an empty campus.
To clear areas, like the dorms, where people park their cars overnight, the department has to arrange for the cars to move.
As of Tuesday afternoon, lots were mostly clear and the department was focusing on trouble spots, such as areas where snow had become packed.
Slick roads and limited parking do not make for a good combination.
“We’re opening as many stalls as we can,” Neumann said. “[Parking reduced for the Olympics] kind of helps us. We’re shorthanded because we had a budget cut.”
Also Tuesday afternoon, sidewalks and entrances were about three-quarters done according to Sue Pope, grounds department supervisor.
The University of Utah campus has roughly 200 buildings?each with three to four entrances plus stairs. About 20 shovelers clear these manually.
The grounds department uses trucks with plows attached to clear the sidewalks. They are also hauling some away to prepare for possible snow later on this week.
The chance for another storm on Thursday is high, according to Jason Shafer, lead forecaster for campus weather service and a graduate student in meteorology.
“There’s a good chance it will start out as rain and turn to snow,” he said, predicting not more than three to six inches for the U.