English stories

Snow removal: Chateauguay to monitor its vehicles’ track marks

le lundi 28 octobre 2019
Modifié à 14 h 45 min le 23 octobre 2019
Par Michel Thibault

mthibault@gravitemedia.com

The City of Chateauguay is going to equip itself with a system enabling it to follow and keep in memory several operations of its vehicles. Michel Thibault Translation Dan Rosenburg This is to have ‘’some responses to give to the citizens’’ and ‘’to improve the service,’’ Mayor Pierre-Paul Routhier said at the Chateauguay public council meeting of October 21. The council meeting awarded to the Geothentic firm the contract to provide and install the apparatus and the program required for the amount of $207,000. The municipality’s 75 vehicles, of which 55 are asssigned to snow removal,  will be endowed with the new system. Thanks to its captors, the system will permit the City to follow its vehicles’ actions and moves, and their route, but also where they spread their abrasives or lift their blade, according to Mayor Routhier. When a citizen will complain to the City that his street has not been cleared of snow, the municipality will be in position to furnish that person with precise explanations, the Mayor informed. ‘’Last year, we received an enormous amount of criticism,’’ Routhier said. ‘’Now we are acting to give outstanding service. And if we don’t furnish it, we will know the reason why,’’ he concluded. In this optic of improvement, a new person has been hired and some equipment has been modified to better dislodge the ice, with which several streets remained covered for weeks last winter. Among other things, some flexible sections are being added to the scraper blades to enable them to scrape the street closer, while diminishing the risk that the metallic part strikes hard the sewer manholes they pass. This is an impact which shakes up the operator when it happens and can cause damage to the apparatus.