[Durham INC] City of Durham Prepares for Winter Weather; Cancels Programs & Meetings

[Blalock, Amy]

CITY OF DURHAM

Office of Public Affairs

101 City Hall Plaza

Durham, NC 27701

 

 

News Release

 

For Details, Contact:

Amy Blalock

Sr. Public Affairs Specialist

(919) 560-4123 x 11253

(919) 475-7735 (cell)

Amy.Blalock at DurhamNC.gov

 

For Immediate Release:  January 10, 2011

 

Durham Prepares for Tonight's Predicted Winter Weather

Parks and Recreation Programs Along With Meetings Canceled Today and
Tomorrow; 

City Hall to Operate Under Its Normal Schedule Tomorrow

 

DURHAM, N.C. - Due to tonight's predicted winter precipitation and the
anticipated icy conditions on many city streets, the City of Durham has
been hard at work preparing street surfaces. 

 

Over the weekend, crews with the City's Street Maintenance Division in
the Public Works Department applied a salt-brine solution on
high-traffic roadways, including bridges and overpasses, throughout the
city limits as well as in the downtown area. Crews are now in operation
for 24 hours through midnight tomorrow, operating five salt-and-sand
trucks dedicated to bridges and one salt-and-sand truck dedicated to
downtown as well as using 34 trucks with plows and loaded salt-and-sand
spreaders for the remaining city streets as soon as the winter
precipitation begins to fall. 

 

The City's plan of action for clearing or reducing hazards on city
streets is prioritized in the following order:

*         Bridges and overpasses throughout the city.

*         Major arterial streets within the city.

*         Streets to essential health facilities, police and fire
stations, and critical community facilities.

*         Routes to two City fuel sites.

*         Streets within the central business district.

*         Clear access to Durham Public Schools.

*         All residential areas with priority initially to passage of
emergency vehicles and then to all traffic.

 

The City's Department of General Services has pre-treated critical
walking surfaces with salt, including the sidewalks around City Hall,
Durham Police Department Headquarters, Durham Station Transportation
Center, Durham Convention Center, SunTrust Plaza, Five Points, the
entrances and exits to the City's downtown parking garages, and the
sidewalks leading to the Durham Performing Arts Center. The parking
areas of Walltown Recreation Center, W.D. Hill Recreation Center, and
Edison Johnson Recreation Center are also pre-treated.

 

In addition, Durham Parks and Recreation (DPR) has canceled its
afterschool programs today. DPR facilities and programs will also be
closed today beginning at 5 p.m. through tomorrow at noon. All City
parks that have entrance gates will be closed at 3 p.m. today as well.
Those parks include Bethesda, Herndon, Old Chapel Hill Road, Pineywood,
Sherwood, Southern Boundaries, Twin Lakes, and Valley Springs. The DPR
Administrative Office, located at 400 Cleveland Street, will open
tomorrow at 8 a.m. as scheduled.

 

Tonight's Durham City-County Environmental Affairs Board work session
and Durham Youth Commission meeting, both scheduled for 6 p.m. at City
Hall, have been canceled as well. The Durham Police Department's Project
Safe Neighborhood Community Response, scheduled for today on Ivy Street,
has also been canceled.

 

City Hall will be open tomorrow morning at 8 a.m. under its normal
schedule. The Joint City-County Committee Meeting scheduled for January
11, 2011, at 9 a.m. in the City Hall Committee Room has been moved to 10
a.m. The Mayor's Committee for Persons with Disabilities, originally
scheduled to meet on Tuesday, January 11 at noon, has been canceled. 

 

Decisions on the collection of curbside solid waste and recycling carts
as well as bulky item and yard waste collections will be made by 9 a.m.
tomorrow after an assessment of the condition of city streets. Residents
are asked to leave their carts on their curb by 7 a.m. tomorrow in the
event collections can proceed as scheduled. If collections must be
suspended, residents should leave the carts at the curb overnight for
collection on Wednesday, weather permitting.  

 

Residents and property owners are responsible for snow and ice removal
in their driveways, apartment access roads, parking lots, and sidewalks.
The clearing of private streets is the responsibility of the homeowners
within that subdivision. In order to facilitate snow and ice removal on
city streets, residents can help by adhering to the following tips:

*         Stay off the roads if at all possible.  If you must drive, be
sure you have good all-weather tires or chains.

*         If at all possible, park your car off the street or highway to
let salt-and-sand spreaders pass with ease.

*         If your problem is a life-or-death emergency, call 911.

 

Durham residents are also reminded to be careful of downed power lines
and should report them to Duke Energy at 1-800-POWERON (1-800-769-3766)
or in Spanish at 1-866-4APAGON (1-866-427-2466). To report downed trees
on city streets, contact the Durham Emergency Communications Center
Non-Emergency line at (919) 560-4600 unless the downed tree presents an
immediate, life-threatening hazard; then motorists should call 911. 

 

Finally, the Durham Police Department advises motorists to treat
intersections with malfunctioning traffic lights as four-way stops and
proceed with caution. The department is also urging motorists to not
drive unless absolutely necessary. If residents must drive, motorists
should drive very slowly and carefully. If involved in a property damage
wreck, motorists should pull off the road to prevent additional
accidents and remember that it may take some additional time for an
officer to respond to the accident due to icy road conditions.

 

For additional information on other City services, facilities, or
programs that may be affected by tonight's winter precipitation, contact
Durham One Call at (919) 560-1200, visit the City's website at 
www.DurhamNC.gov or tune into DTV8 either on Time Warner Cable channel 8
or online at www.DurhamNC.gov/DTV8. 

 

###

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://rtpnet.org/pipermail/inc-list/attachments/20110110/de7e7dc2/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image002.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 3070 bytes
Desc: image002.jpg
URL: <http://rtpnet.org/pipermail/inc-list/attachments/20110110/de7e7dc2/attachment.jpg>