• Cyburbia is a friendly big tent, where we share our experiences and thoughts about urban planning practice, the built environment, planning adjacent topics, and anything else that comes to mind. No ads, no spam, and it's free. It's easy to join!

NEVERENDING ♾️ The NEVERENDING Weather Thread

We got a couple inches of snow late last week. This morning it was 12 degrees out. That's hardly surprising considering it's January, but I guess we got too used to having this absurdly mild winter thus far, because that 12 degrees cut right through me.
 
JNA said:
The coldest town in every state
https://www.usatoday.com/list/weath...d6-d9d6-467d-89f0-b3c9b55ec151/?block=alabama

Which one have you visited ?
Click to expand...

I've been to Saranac, NY and Allagash, ME (and the areas around them) a few times. Never to Saranac in the winter but I have been up around Allagash and Fort Kent in the winter.

Looking at a map, I must have been through Clarksburg, MI a few times (I had to look that one up because I had never heard of it) as it's right on the main route through the UP to go to Michigan Tech or west to Duluth.
 
We had to go up to the beach yesterday to get some stuff that was left up there. It may be Michigan's Thumb but it looked like some sort of bleak Arctic landscape.


50170593_10103172653658816_8625243531025317888_o.jpg


50405199_10103172653514106_4789322700399050752_o.jpg


49899990_10103172653464206_7701675066731266048_o.jpg


Usually if we go up in the winter, it's just my wife or myself and we are there for about 10 minutes and then headed back home. This might have been the first time our daughter was up there when the ice was starting to form on the lake and she thought it was the coolest thing ever. We'll have to take her back up there in a few more weeks when the ice is usually in huge piles that could be 6'+ high.
 
Maister said:
We got a couple inches of snow late last week. This morning it was 12 degrees out. That's hardly surprising considering it's January, but I guess we got too used to having this absurdly mild winter thus far, because that 12 degrees cut right through me.
Click to expand...


Yeah, it got down to 12F in Toledo too. That's the coldest in almost a month, I believe. But at least it was calm winds, so it didn't feel too bad. Much better than a day of 30F with winds to match..
 
There was a winter weather advisory overnight for some freezing rain. There are about 100+ districts closed but they are all to the west of us so our daughter was very disappointed - the dividing line seems to be our neighborhood as the district that starts just to the west of us is closed (as are the ones that neighbor that district, both north and south).

My drive to work this morning seemed fine.
 
Doohickie said:
My district in suburban Buffalo was like that. Everyone else would be closed and we'd be stuck in school. :(
Click to expand...


For us, I think it comes down to the fact that our district primarily serves a very dense, old suburb on a grid layout and a few adjacent neighborhoods (like ours) that are likewise compact and dense. Our buses don't really have far to travel and the urban heat island is more pronounced so our roads don't ice over quite so much so when there is just ice or freezing rain we are less likely to close.

But when we get just a few inches of snow, because of the narrow streets and on-street parking around our elementary schools, which are all located in residential neighborhoods, plowing near the schools is always slow so we are more likely to close for a relatively light snow than many of the surrounding districts to the north and west which are all in more spread out suburban and exurban areas.

I have no data or written policy that backs up my theory but I'm sticking to it.
 
Are you south of 696? (I used to live in Oakland County, then in Dearborn).

I grew up in a first-ring suburb of Buffalo. At that time it was moderately affluent in that we had good facilities and equipment, so we were always plowed out pretty quickly. If we got a foot of snow but it stopped by midnight, the town would be largely cleared by morning, including side streets.

Also, we were on the edge of the snow belt. South of us typically got much more snow than where we were. In 2014 when Buffalo got 6 feet of snow in a little over a day, there was a picture floating around that was taken along the major street on the edge of my neighborhood, looking west. Everything to the right (north) was clear; there was a blizzard to the south. That was pretty extreme but a pretty good illustration of how localized lake effect snow can be.
 
Last edited:
Doohickie said:
Are you south of 696? (I used to live in Oakland County, then in Dearborn).
Click to expand...

I live about 4 miles north of 696 right around the borders of Bloomfield Hills/Beverly Hills/Birmingham and my office is a couple miles north of M-59.

Whenever inclimate or severe weather rolls through the area, there seems to be a very clear divide where areas east of Telegraph or south of Square Lake Road get significantly different weather (for better or worse) than areas on the other side of those roads.

I was in a meeting this afternoon with a couple of my bosses who drive in from Fenton (far west) and Flint (north) and they said their drives were horrible and a woman I work with who lives in West Bloomfield, just a few miles directly west of me, said the side of her car was covered in a sheet of ice when she came to work this morning.
 
It's been dreary for over a week here. Haven't seen that close star for days.
 
There was a dusting of snow overnight. Supposedly there is more coming late Saturday into Sunday. I think we're right on the break between snow and rain so if the front pushes the cold air further south we'll get more. Guess we'll see.
 
We had about 4" of snow on Saturday through the day. It was very light and powdery so my daughter was bummed that it wasn't good packing snow... but it didn't really matter since the high temperatures on Sunday and Monday were about 4º (-15º with the windchill), not exactly good playing outdoors weather.

Our elementary school is closed again today thanks to a water main break but it's a little warmer. Maybe they'll get outside for a bit.
 
We got 12-15 inches in my part of NEOH. Shoveled twice on Saturday and then for 2.5 hours straight on Sunday morning.

One snow storm and the piles are looking good along the sides and at the ends of the driveway.

Today, it's frigid this morning, but will be about 30F by the afternoon with rain starting tonight.

Rain and over a foot of standing snow pack don't go together well. :down:
 
It's Canadian cold in the Dirty Jerzey and there isn't any snow to go with it.
 
The streets were coated with a sheet of black ice last evening. The temps have warmed to around 32/33 and there's currently a slushy mix on the streets. The crews have been working overtime laying salt & sand. I guess it could be worse - oh wait, the drop in temp is coming later.
 
3 hour delay for schools this morning due to light rain and the potential for black ice.

Temps hovered about 30/31 last night so there was little ice on plants, powerlines and such, but none on the road really on the way to work. On employee said there were some patches on the interstate (& saw 1 car spin). We should get up to 40+ today and with more rain it'll be wet, but no ice.
 
Maister said:
The streets were coated with a sheet of black ice last evening. The temps have warmed to around 32/33 and there's currently a slushy mix on the streets. The crews have been working overtime laying salt & sand.
Click to expand...

Are schools closed over there? Last I looked we're close to 800 closings on this side of the state and the airport has been closed completely since yesterday evening.

I went out to go to the gym last night around 8:30 p.m. and it was just starting to get icy. It was exponentially worse when I left the gym to go home just about 90 minutes later. This morning I got up around 6:00 a.m. and saw I had a voicemail - it was the automated message that the district is closed because of the weather (and she had no school yesterday because of a water main break at her school and no school on Monday). I left to go to the gym and rode the brake and basically coasted the entire way there. By the time I left to drive to the office around 8:00 a.m. it had warmed up enough and the salt trucks were out that the roads were fine.

I will add that the first round of freezing rain came through right around 4:00 p.m. yesterday and it was still pretty cold so the snow wasn't melting. When I got home I took my daughter to the sledding hill and man was it slick and fast!
 
Here it is still slightly chilly. In Kansas it is iced over frozen hell. You know, typical winter's day in the glove state. So glad I live where a light jacket is all I ever need.
 
dvdneal said:
Here it is still slightly chilly.
Click to expand...

I just looked up the current temp in Phoenix and it's colder than I would have imagined. It's actually only about 1º cooler here right now. Of course, we're probably at about our high for the day you've got that glowing yellow orb in the sky that you'll be able to see all week...
 
WSU MUP Student said:
Are schools closed over there? Last I looked we're close to 800 closings on this side of the state and the airport has been closed completely since yesterday evening.

I will add that the first round of freezing rain came through right around 4:00 p.m. yesterday and it was still pretty cold so the snow wasn't melting. When I got home I took my daughter to the sledding hill and man was it slick and fast!
Click to expand...
Yes, they closed schools on Monday due to the cold temps. They were open on Tuesday, but by Tuesday evening they'd cancelled all evening activities because of the hazardous road conditions, and of course today they're closed all day.

Junior happens to be grounded right now and really can't take advantage of this opportunity as much as he might like (we live 100 yards from the neighborhood sledding hill).
 
Planit said:
3 hour delay for schools this morning due to light rain and the potential for black ice.

Temps hovered about 30/31 last night so there was little ice on plants, powerlines and such, but none on the road really on the way to work. On employee said there were some patches on the interstate (& saw 1 car spin). We should get up to 40+ today and with more rain it'll be wet, but no ice.
Click to expand...
3 hour delay? Is that like a 2 hour delay? We only have three options - regular day, two hour delay, or cancelled.
 
Hink said:
3 hour delay? Is that like a 2 hour delay? We only have three options - regular day, two hour delay, or cancelled.
Click to expand...


The weird thing about today is...it was originally a day off, but was changed due to a snow-day closing so they REALLY wanted to get the day in.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I just looked up the current temp in Phoenix and it's colder than I would have imagined. It's actually only about 1º cooler here right now. Of course, we're probably at about our high for the day you've got that glowing yellow orb in the sky that you'll be able to see all week...
Click to expand...

Temp wise it might be similar to colder places, but like you said there's the big glowing thing and very little wind to deal with. My experience is it's the wind that kills you.
 
Winter in Upstate New York. Slush and dirty snow. Mid-30s (2-3 C), with on-and-off rain.

IMG_0327.jpg
 
Temps fell pretty quickly from the upper 30s last night to the mid 20s this morning and the melting snow has frozen over on the roads. There are a lot of closures again today, but mostly in the far northern and western 'burbs where there are many dirt roads. I was checking the school closing list with my fingers crossed. After having no school for the past 5 days, my daughter needs to be out of the house! Thankfully, our district was open today.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
Temps fell pretty quickly from the upper 30s last night to the mid 20s this morning and the melting snow has frozen over on the roads. There are a lot of closures again today, but mostly in the far northern and western 'burbs where there are many dirt roads. I was checking the school closing list with my fingers crossed. After having no school for the past 5 days, my daughter needs to be out of the house! Thankfully, our district was open today.
Click to expand...

We are dealing with the opposite. It was in the teens on Tuesday morning and in the mid 60's this morning with quite a bit of rain.
 
Varying back and forth between Ithacating and snowing. Temperatures in the low 30s. (-1 - 1 C). Overcast skies. Mud, ice, and sluch everywhere. Gravel driveways are the default around here, and ours is a mess. Last summer, it was flat, with perfect aggregate coverage -- no exposed dirt, no low sports. I think in a couple of months, it'll be just a pair of cart tracks. (Home improvement work costs about twice as much as in one of the Thruway cities, so paving is out of the question this year.) The garage floor is such a mess, it looks like someone dressed a deer there.

IMG_0328.JPG


IMG_0333.JPG
 
Dan said:
The garage floor is such a mess, it looks like someone dressed a deer there.
Click to expand...

That's always one of my biggest pet peeves about this time of year. I rarely drive down a dirt road and our driveway is paved but the undercarriages of our vehicles are always covered in slush so the floor of our garage is constantly just a big puddle. There also seems to be absolutely no slope to our garage floor so the slush just sits there. I need to buy one of those big squeegees people use on outdoor tennis courts!

Sometimes, if I think about it, when I get home for the day I just leave my car in the driveway for a few hours and let everything drip off out there.
 
Checked the weather and saw high Wednesday of 14 so I thought, hey not so bad. Looked closer and it really said -14.
 
By about 8:00 p.m. last night there were already nearly 800 school closings for today in anticipation for a snow storm that was supposed to start dumping on us around 6:00 a.m. It's now 9:00 a.m. and the snow just started falling but it is coming down pretty good. They are forecasting somewhere between 5" to 10" with the worst of it coming around the start of the evening commute.

After the snow comes, we're forecast to have some sub-0º temps for the rest of the week.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
By about 8:00 p.m. last night there were already nearly 800 school closings for today in anticipation for a snow storm that was supposed to start dumping on us around 6:00 a.m. It's now 9:00 a.m. and the snow just started falling but it is coming down pretty good. They are forecasting somewhere between 5" to 10" with the worst of it coming around the start of the evening commute.

After the snow comes, we're forecast to have some sub-0º temps for the rest of the week.
Click to expand...

It is days like today that make me appreciate living in the South. It has been a bit cooler than average, but nothing compared to the -50 wind chills in parts of the midwest.
 
...WIND CHILL ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM MIDNIGHT TUESDAY NIGHT TO NOON CST WEDNESDAY...

* WHAT...Very cold wind chills expected. Wind chills as low as 10 to 20 below zero likely.
 
JNA said:
...WIND CHILL ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM MIDNIGHT TUESDAY NIGHT TO NOON CST WEDNESDAY...

* WHAT...Very cold wind chills expected. Wind chills as low as 10 to 20 below zero likely.
Click to expand...

I saw "windchill as low as -50" for Minneapolis. -45 for Milwaukee. That is crazy.
 
Calling for wind chills in the -30 somethings tomorrow. Brrrr
Given the choice between a -30 air temp with no wind or a 0 degree air temp with wind chills in, say, the -10's I'll take the -30 air temps without the wind, thanks.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top