City crews have begun street scraping, sweeping and flushing streets to remove winter sand.  

Did you know that approximately 80 km of roadway is cleaned of sand annually?

Crews began last week with the scraping of bulk sand accumulations to prepare the streets for sweeping.  Street sweepers are not able to efficiently sweep the bulk sand accumulations so other equipment is deployed first to scrape, pile and dispose of the winter sand.  When the bulk sand accumulation has been removed, sweeping can begin.   After the sweeping process has been completed, the roads are flushed to wash away the fine particles that remain after the street sweeper has completed the sweeping work.

Schedule for Street Cleaning - City crews first start with cleaning up sand at the lower elevation areas and work their way uphill.  

The areas are swept in the following order: 

• Fairview
• Downtown, Gyro Park area, View Street area, lower Uphill
• Upper Uphill
• Rosemont

City crews have started the cleanup in the Fairview neighbourhood and have also been doing cleanup work in the downtown as part of their early morning and evening work.      

Rake Sand Off Sidewalks and Boulevards - If your home is adjacent to a boulevard, please rake the sand from the sidewalks and boulevard onto the street beside the curb.  This material will be collected while City crews do the sand cleanup.  Raking sand from sidewalks and boulevard onto the street will help reduce the amount of dust present in your neighbourhood.  

A big thank you to all residents who rake the sand from the sidewalks and boulevard year after year!

Notification – Residents will begin to see sandwich boards being placed in neighbourhoods to provide residents with notice of upcoming clearing activities.  Please look for these signs in your neighbourhood and observe the odd/even parking rule to help crews efficiently remove the winter sand.

Odd / Even Parking Rule - Please remember to follow the odd-even parking rule, within residential areas, by parking your vehicle on the odd-numbered side of the street on odd-numbered dates, and the even-numbered side of the street on even-numbered dates.  Please note, vehicles that do not follow the odd-even rule may be towed. 

Closures - Some streets may have to be barricaded to complete the sweeping. 

Questions?  publicworks@nelson.ca or call us at 250-352-8238