Snowbound

My Neighborhood Is Coping Valiantly 

I live in the Rittenhouse Square section of Philadelphia. We haven't been getting much snow in recent years, but the occasional snowfall has often been disruptive because many homeowners have seemed blissfully unaware that they are supposed to shovel the sidewalk in front of their houses.

That seemed to change this time around. Areas in my neighborhood where I was accustomed to seeing sheets of ice, sometimes deceptively covered with snow, were instead clear shortly after the snow stopped falling. 

What caused this miraculous shift? I don't know. I'm just grateful.

There's still a lot of snow on the ground, and it's going to be there for a while. I'm sure there are some laggard blocks somewhere, and the intersections can be dicey (wheelchairs and baby carriages are going to have a lot of trouble), but Rittenhouse is walkable.

(The bike lanes are of course a mess. The worst I saw was the lane running down from the Chestnut street bridge to 22nd street. But this is supposed to be a happy story, so we'll save the bike lanes for another day.)

(The problem with the intersections has been around forever, and strikes me as a tragedy of the commons issue. Local homeowners may not feel responsible because the snow blockage is largely in the street. And the snow plow guys are busy clearing the streets for vehicles. So the street corner is a no man's land. The same issue seems to arise with bus stops. Nobody is responsible for clearing the snow that stands on the curb and disrupts any movements across the curb. Who will look after the liminal space?)

(My wife just returned from walking a six-year-old to school. She said the intersections were brutal, but she used a different word. Actually several different words.)

(So I guess I'll take my snow shovel and my spade - there's a lot of ice now - and spend the afternoon clearing corners. I may even uncover a few of the storm drains.)

See also Sweeping the Bike Lane, This Does Happen.