The scariest thing about snow in Seattle...
December 9, 2016 1:04 PM   Subscribe

...is the Seattleites who drive in it. With the news that an actual measurable amount of snow fell in the Pacific Northwest, The Stranger is here with a few short films of low speed local failures to navigate a light dusting of the white stuff.
posted by Existential Dread (71 comments total) 11 users marked this as a favorite
 
Here in Pittsburgh, they close bus stops at the tops of hills, much to the chagrin of new residents who don't know to check the website.

Living in a city with a competent system for snow is definitely eye-opening, although Lord knows if they don't salt every single street before a storm, the city will hear about it.
posted by muddgirl at 1:13 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


Cue the annual cry of "it's not us, it's the hills" from Seattle-ites ignoring the fact that hills do not drive cars down themselves.
posted by fshgrl at 1:21 PM on December 9, 2016 [24 favorites]


As amusing as it is to blame these drivers for being unable to navigate snow, that's not what's happening: they're having difficulty in snow followed by freezing rain, which is a very different prospect. The roads may be white, but they're attempting to navigate black ice.
I don't know the provenance of every one of these videos, and we in the PNW certainly have our share of incapable drivers, but yesterday's was an ice storm and traffic difficulties in that scenario are not quite as ridiculous as they're made out to be.

after a half-day of thawing, the trees on my property are still encased in ~5mm of ice.
posted by tiaz at 1:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [27 favorites]


It doesn't take much snow to make driving, especially on hills, treacherous. Even for people who are used to lots of snow: Montreal buses, cars, police cruiser and even salt truck slide down hill.
posted by Kabanos at 1:28 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


they're attempting to navigate black ice

Which is the mistake. There is no reason to try to drive down an ice covered hill like the ones in the video. Just because you really have to be somewhere does not change the laws of physics.

Most of being good at driving in snow is knowing when not to go somewhere.
posted by fshgrl at 1:35 PM on December 9, 2016 [44 favorites]


Boy, that guy just kept on hitting the gas, didn't he? That must be some sort of fight-or-flight reaction happening. "Accelerate away from the slippery danger! Go! Go!"

One of my sisters, a lifelong Los Angeles resident, married a Canadian, so she moved to Toronto. In mid-January. On day two she ended up sliding into a snowbank, and called home saying "I can't do this! It's so cold!" She did, eventually, I assume, learn to drive in the snow, since she's been there for 20 years now.
posted by curiousgene at 1:36 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


There are similar sights here in Portland on snow days, like today! And it's inevitable that there are rolled eyes and complaints from people who've previously lived in (and driven in) wintry climes like Minneapolis or Boston or Toronto or wherever. They can't believe that schools shut down and everyone "freaks out" and gets into accidents with just an inch or two of the white stuff.

And then, after a few icy/snowy experiences in the typically milder climates of valleys in the Pacific Northwest, you understand why. For one, cities like Seattle and Portland don't have large fleets of snowplows, so the sidestreets usually go unplowed. For another, they tend not to use much rock salt, due to fears of it getting into the rivers. (And homeowners usually don't have it either for their sidewalks, since this only happens about once every two years.) Then there are a lot of transplants here – some from places where they think they know how to drive in wintry conditions, and others from warm places where they've got no idea. Only a small portion will have chains or snow tires, since we need them so infrequently unless we're going into the mountains regularly. And most significantly, when we get snow the temperature rarely dips down to 25 or so – it tends to hover just around 30 to 35 F. So it's warm enough for it to melt slightly and then cold enough for it to freeze, over and over. So soon there's lots of deceptive ice under the snow and on the sidewalks. Once you've slid out while driving or fallen hard on a sidewalk, you understand why things are different here.
posted by lisa g at 1:36 PM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]


Dear FSM, a few hours North of Seattle, we got 5cm overnight Sunday/Monday and the city basically shut down due to car accidents.

We've got another 15-20cm coming in right now.

Sorry [pic]
posted by porpoise at 1:37 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]


I drove through Portland and Seattle in a big snowstorm once and shutting the city down is the right call, imho. There is very little that can't wait a day or two.
posted by fshgrl at 1:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]


I live in Chicago, but do not have a car (take bus/CTA/cabs all the time) and driving in snow or ice is probably the #1 thing I do NOT miss about driving.

The movie "Sid and Nancy" is forever linked in my mind with the time in high school when I went with friends to see it, me driving, and it snowed really heavy that night on the way home. It was probably my first serious "driving in hazardous snow conditions" and I was terrified I was gonna get in a wreck with my friends in the car.
posted by dnash at 1:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


There should be a word for those of us in the NW that are proud of the fact we don't know jack shit about driving in the snow. Yeah, and I realize being proud of ignorance makes me an ideal Trump supporter, maybe a better mind than mine can figure a way to use boastful ignorance as a wedge to bring the two sides together.
posted by Keith Talent at 1:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]


Years ago, when I lived in the Seattle metro area, I was working for a tech company in an Eastside suburb. The first time it snowed while I was living there was the day of a company-wide "All Hands" meeting first thing in the morning, so I was kind of surprised to show up in the office and find I was one of only three people who had come to work that day. There had been barely three quarters of an inch of snowfall and (having come from a part of the Great Lakes region which routinely got dumped on by "lake effect" snows) I barely noticed it..

Though filled with scorn for my soft-living co-workers I quickly moved on to other things and forgot about it, until one night when I left a function in the wee hours of the morning down in Auburn and found an inch or so of snow on my car. I brushed it off and got on the freeway and started driving home, only to discover that at four in the morning the Washington State Highway Patrol had shut down the freeways surrounding the very major interchange between I-405 and I-90. I wound up stuck in a motionless traffic jam that lasted five hours. When traffic finally started moving again I passed countless cars that had simply been abandoned on the freeway overnight by people who had apparently decided to finish their trips on foot. What they thought would happen to their cars I still don't know..

After that I was a little more charitable to Seattleites who panic at the thought of snow on the road. It's not necessarily the case that any individual Seattleite can't drive in snow (heck, a substantial number trundle up to the Snoqualmie or Stevens Passes for alpine sports every weekend) but there are enough on the road who can't that you take a big gamble being on the road when snow is in the forecast.
posted by Nerd of the North at 1:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


Today as I was driving to work north of Seattle I noticed a man who had pulled over and stopped due to the unsafe conditions. I couldn't help but laugh at him as he stood there in the snow - next to his motorcycle.
posted by the stupidest genius at 1:53 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


This is one of those tropes based primarily on regional biases and very short memories. Those of us who have spent sufficient winter driving time in both the Pacific Northwest and climates with more regular snowfall can tell you that these annual complaints are typically missing two very important points:

1) At least half the time, the people driving unsafely for the conditions around here are not locals, but people from elsewhere who are sure that they they are too experienced in winter driving to worry about the things like hills and black ice or other differences in local conditions.
2) People drive stupidly in winter/wind up in ditches/crash ALL THE DAMN TIME in states with tons of snow, too, even when there's hardly any on the ground. ALL THE DAMN TIME. People just have really short memories and unfounded regional biases. Seriously, all you superior winter drivers from other states. I've passed you in the ditches, both here and abroad. I know your secret shame.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 1:54 PM on December 9, 2016 [33 favorites]


It's not necessarily the case that any individual Seattlite can't drive in snow (heck, a substantial number trundle up to the Snoqualmie or Stevens Passes for alpine sports every weekend) but there are enough on the road who can't that you take a big gamble being on the road when snow is in the forecast.

I used to see the same thing in the Twin Cities, where they really should know what the hell they're doing. And the first big storm of the year is always the worst because the people who don't know better are always the ones caught out in it or the ones that make the worst choices driving in it.

Now we're back in rural North Dakota and generally, most people know what the hell they're doing. But there's still fragments of the oil boom about and man, if you think Seattlites are crippled you should see truck drivers from Alabama try to navigate a prairie storm. The other night we were playing games with some friends and talking about an upcoming snowfall. One member of our group is on the local ambulance crew and he was groaning because it meant there would be yet another poor transplant who would end up in the ditch. And the ambulance crew would get the call.
posted by Ber at 2:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


One day, I walked in on my best friend and my husband commiserating about all the black guys on street corners in our city, talking about how they'd have to roll straight through intersections without stopping and how scary it all was, and I stood there, stunned, horrified, and confused for several very long seconds before I realized they were saying black ice.

That was probably the best time a sitcom ever happened to me in real life, so I am grateful for this opportunity to share it.

Black ice really is scary. Much worse than snow.
posted by ernielundquist at 2:06 PM on December 9, 2016 [34 favorites]


Obligatory: You have to look out for that treacherous black ice.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 2:20 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]


Haha Seattle, now everyone is laughing at you!

Sincerely,
Atlanta
posted by dudemanlives at 2:20 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]


And then there are the drivers who with first time 4 wheel drive believe they can do anything in snow or on black ice. They discover otherwise
posted by Postroad at 2:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]




People drive stupidly in winter/wind up in ditches/crash ALL THE DAMN TIME in states with tons of snow, too

I think another part of it is when it snows all the time, there's almost no chance you could call off from work: you'd miss weeks of work. So you have to take the risk unless it's absolutely horrid. My first snow in Seattle I made it to work on the Eastside no problem. Smirked at the doctor who said only the people with all wheel drive would made it in (I drove an old Honda civic). Since virtually no patients showed up we closed up shop early and went home. I just called out the next time rather than be bored.

There's a lot less cars in ditches after the first really bad storm of the year reminds people how to drive in the snow. Seattle just has a snowstorm every couple of years rather than every couple of weeks, so literally every storm has people driving at their worst.
posted by ghost phoneme at 2:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


I spent years driving in Denver and Boulder -- and all over in the mountains above Boulder for cross country ski trips -- and driving on snowy streets in Seattle is much harder that that was.

For one thing, Seattle seems to have an ungodly crown on most streets, presumably to deal with runoff from all the rain, and it can be very difficult in the snow to keep your car from sliding toward the curb, which is usually lined with parked cars.

And the hill thing is real, too; there's the bottom of a one block hill 100 ft. from my front door which is so steep the sidewalk keeps sliding down it and pushing the curb into the street.
posted by jamjam at 2:53 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]


I grew up driving in the mountains of Colorado. The thing that drives me nuts about the "lol dusting of snow shuts down $CITY_OF_NO_SNOW, bad drivers amirite" is that roads are completely different at 28-35F than they are at 25F and below. Roads that are just barely frozen are the most treacherous. I'd rather drive on ice at well below freezing temps (you'll have some traction at those temps) than deal with wet roads right at the cusp of freezing, where you go from good traction to absolutely none with no warning.

On preview, shout out to jamjam
posted by forforf at 2:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]


Yeah, I'm from the Pacific Northwest, but I worked residential construction in Michigan for awhile, and was very intimidated the first time it snowed, because out here we always hear about how we don't know how to drive in the snow, and I knew I'd have to be driving all over through the snow all winter. So imagine my surprise when virtually everyone I worked with or knew wrecked, or wound up in a ditch, or at the very least spun out or got themselves stuck at some point over the winter. Eventually I realized that it wasn't that Midwest drivers on average were any better in snow than Pacific Northwest drivers. It's that they were less stressed about it (but more over-confident), and that the cost of messing up was much less (most of the ditches in the Michigan countryside where I was were just ditches: a slight dip off the side of the road with snow over dirt, gravel, or grass. But you start to slide out here and chances are you're gonna gain some real momentum before you eventually level out; and frequently, you're taking a number of other cars with you when you go).
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]


Montreal buses, cars, police cruiser and even salt truck slide down hill.

I laugh when I watch that video every. single. time.
I am so going to hell.

They can't believe that schools shut down and everyone "freaks out"...

Frankly, I think it's a very good idea to shut schools down. It sucks, especially for the single moms and people in the type of jobs that they just can't stay home. You don't just jump out and find a sitter on short notice like that, and the care centers are usually swamped and can't take all the younger kids. But in this litigious society, all it takes is one wreck with kids seriously injured or killed, and it can bankrupt the school district. One wreck, and the sleet can hit the fan.

It's been forty years, but I still remember being 20 and living in the winter hell that was Pittsburgh while learning how to drive a manual transmission.

Try black ice on the Idaho I84 either in a fog or a 40 mph wind. At night. The posted limit is 80 mp, and some people just don't grock the idea of 'driving to conditions.'
posted by BlueHorse at 3:09 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


Obligatory link to The Oatmeal.
posted by Hatashran at 3:10 PM on December 9, 2016


And then there are the drivers who with first time 4 wheel drive believe they can do anything in snow or on black ice.

This! It's always weird when they tailgate in crappy weather. Let's pretend 4 wheel drive is magic, why are they driving so close to my crappy car that they'd have problems not rear ending me in normal conditions? My crappy car that clearly does not have all wheel drive, so it seems like they'd want to stay away from me.

It is somewhat satisfying when they eventually decide to blow by me and I then pass their car in a ditch a short time later.

Seattle is the only time I've had a little sports car tailgate me in slush. The entire length of the unplowed 520 bridge, just me and jerkface. I even changed lanes, but they just stayed right on my ass. Once we got to a plowed patch of road they still didn't blow by me. I think they just figured if I drove over it they could too, but why so close!? Was my MI license that interesting?

roads are completely different at 28-35F

Yeah, but I think the bigger difference is the lack of road care. 28-35 is not unusual in SE MI. But we have more plows and use salt on our roads.
posted by ghost phoneme at 3:10 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


As an East Coast transplant to Seattle, chiming in to add another "It's not the snow, it's a goddamned black ice." I live on Beacon and had a few really hairy moments trying to get home from my Sodo job, which entails going up a serious hill. Ended up going fifteen minutes out of my way to take that overpass off of Jackson, the one at the north end that takes you past that giant art deco hospital.

Seattle ices at the drop of a hat.
posted by a power-tie-wearing she-capitalist at 3:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]


In and around Chicago I do really good, even being a Louisiana transplant but Chicago salts and plows the shit out of these roads. Knowing what to do when stuck is important. I drive manual, and that helps.

But my old job there use to be a rather steep dip to accomodate a low viaduct overhead. The top of both sides had stop signs. It was also a brick road, and ice accumulated pretty easy. I'd take lunch breaks with coffee to watch the mayhem unfold, especially when people would not run the stop sign over and over, and slide back down.
posted by AlexiaSky at 3:30 PM on December 9, 2016


Black ice is the devil, but that doesn't make it any less weird when they close after school programs with three inches of snow on the roads.
posted by corb at 3:35 PM on December 9, 2016


Studded tires. October 1st. No matter what.
posted by Sternmeyer at 3:38 PM on December 9, 2016


Presumably in order to help everyone learn to drive in poor conditions by ensuring the roads are fucked up all year round. ;)
posted by howfar at 3:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]


The road to Hell is paved with stud indentions.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [27 favorites]


It's not that Seattle drivers are terrible in the snow that surprises me, nearly every city is pretty terrible in the snow in my opinion, short of a few places that gets enormous amounts.

It's that Seattle drivers are terrible in the rain.
posted by petrilli at 3:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]


I love this kind of thread - it's a great way to get a glimpse of a narrow but very deep slice of human experience in a slightly different culture from my own. The to-and-fro of people discussing common experiences without the grandstanding that sometimes goes with more contentious topics is something I really enjoy about this place.

Anyway, carry on.
posted by pipeski at 3:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]


My parents used to live in the Midwest and are in Seattle now. They've driven through monster blizzards but still give the local snow/thaw/freeze a wide berth. It's scary. They're really fortunate; there's a grocery store they can walk to and no big hills in between. They MIGHT run out of library books.

Then there's my niece from the PNW who's going to college in southern Minnesota. All her friends from the Midwest were worried about the floods this fall. "What floods?" "You know, all the rain we've been having?" "THIS is a lot of rain?"
posted by Orange Dinosaur Slide at 3:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


Meanwhile in Vancouver, the Simon Fraser U swim team just takes advantage of the opportunity to practice their snow swimming skills.
posted by wenat at 3:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]


My neighbors are elementary school teachers, and have young kids. Today they woke up to find out that one adult's school was open as usual, one adult's school was open with a two hour delay, and their kids' schools were all closed.
posted by The corpse in the library at 4:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]


If you brake and start sliding because all four wheels are locked up on ice, try taking your foot off the brake and steering towards something safe to hit. Don't just sit there as you slide sideways downhill for block after block!
posted by monotreme at 4:13 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]


There is no magic ability that allows somebody to drive competently on sheer ice.

Winter tires get you half way there.
posted by Talez at 4:28 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


I live halfway between Burlington MA and Nashua NH and I always put my winter tires on 1st of December. So many people are on all seasons around here and it's not just snow grip but cold grip. You can gain 20% braking distance when the road is wet and it's less than 45 degrees. I've had more than one time where some idiot in all seasons in an SUV in an inch of snow has understeered over to the wrong side of the road and threatens to collect me in their insanity.
posted by Talez at 4:32 PM on December 9, 2016


Seattleites don't think Seattleites can't drive in the snow, because they know their neighbors negotiate the mountain passes and the ski areas just fine. Seattleites blame these incidents on newbs from California.
posted by OHenryPacey at 4:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


For one, cities like Seattle and Portland don't have large fleets of snowplows

One of the open secrets about the PNW in general is that both the cities themselves, and their inhabitants, are continuously colossally, hilariously unprepared for and surprised by any slight variation in the expected weather conditions that are expected for that time of year, be it a bit more sun or heat than the mild summer heat they usually have, more snow than the very small amount of snow that they occasionally have, or even more rain and wind than the quite large amount of rain and wind that they usually have.

I don't know exactly why this is the case, but it definitely is.Coming from the UK, this attitude feels very home-y. The only real difference in attitudes to weather between there and hear seems to be the tradition of people suddenly breaking out the shorts and flip-flops in the spring on the first non-rainy day that rises above 7 degrees C.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 4:44 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]


But ice? Forget about it. I don't care where you are from. There is no magic ability that allows somebody to drive competently on sheer ice.
posted by Seymour Zamboni


Epon-ice-sterical!

Learned to drive in Boston, then moved to Austin. You have not seen anything until you've watched Austinites deal with the slight snow and black ice they get every 3-4 years or so, or used to. I was afraid to walk on those days, let alone drive. Cars akimbo.

Then I lived in Seattle a few years, and the drivers aren't that bad really. Just passive aggressive AF, regardless of weather.
posted by spitbull at 4:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


I don't know exactly why this is the case, but it definitely is.

I really do think it's because so many of the people here now aren't really from here, so they kind of lack context. Plus the weather here has been pretty a-typical for the last 10 years. So even if you are from here, it's hard to really be mentally prepared for record-setting conditions all the time.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 4:54 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


Meanwhile in Portland

(Spoiler: flaming pipes, piper, kilt, unicycle, GoT)
posted by wenat at 4:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]


There is no magic ability that allows somebody to drive competently on sheer ice.

Yep, I've lived on steep hills like that most of my life and I just don't drive up and down them when it's icy unless they've been sanded or salted or both. Even if it's my driveway and I have do it myself.

As an aside years ago I lived in a cabin in the woods and when it was icy we used to park our trucks leaned into trees so they wouldn't slide away when we got out from the force of us closing the door. Big trucks on studded tires. That anyone would stop at the top of a 12% grade on solid ice then decide to just go for it boggles my mind.
posted by fshgrl at 5:07 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


Especially bus drivers!!
posted by fshgrl at 5:45 PM on December 9, 2016


Well that first car in the first video clearly rolled onto black ice but then did a perfect 360, bumped nothing and continued on. It's the folks that are going along up hill with just enough traction and just decide "oh no snow" and stop dead. No way to get going then. grrr.

That anyone would stop at the top of a 12% grade on solid ice then decide to just go for it boggles my mind

Ha ah ha, on the back side of Queen Ann (not your wimpy 12) I was trundling along down a long one way with no turn out options and someones pipe had broke and an entire block stretch was perfect ice rink shiny ice! Hit it at a crawl, slid in a perfect 45 degree skew, found pavement and was just fine.

Really have not noticed that the percentage of "idjets" is much different between the North West and North East. Lot of folks just go along with reasonable care but some just go "eek snow" floor it Gus.
posted by sammyo at 6:04 PM on December 9, 2016


The first winter after I moved to Seattle, there was a storm that dropped something in excess of 6" of snow. I had moved west to Seattle earlier that year, in the midst of a winter of what was (until a few years ago) record levels of snow in Boston, so I was kind of unimpressed. Until I realized there was no sand/salt or plows. At which point I realized that, in fact, the idea that places that don't normally get hit with snow really do shut down for good reason - because there's no fucking traction on the roads. Although at least tire chains are legal and trivially purchasable for consumer vehicles. (This is not the case around Boston)

The day after that storm, I was unable to get my 2wd pickup truck up the (not particularly big) hill out of my apartment complex, so I called the management company and asked when they were going to plow. "We don't plow." "What do you mean you don't plow? There's a foot of snow out there." "It just melts by the afternoon, usually." "Riiiiiight."

So I walked to work. And then, that evening after walking home, I helped teach a jeep-owning neighbor how to park her car in the slippery snow. Which had, in fact, not melted.

So, yeah, I hadn't really realized just how staggeringly disabling even minor amounts of snow are to places without the infrastructure to handle it.
posted by rmd1023 at 7:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]


I drove a 4WD with studded tires through a few inches of snow yesterday and will probably have to drive through active snowfall back over Donner Summit next week. It wasn't nearly as scary as I thought it would be, but see also 4WD and studded tires.

But I've decided that I love snow as long as I don't have to take public transportation in it. Snow in NYC is a bitch and a half (frozen dog poop and slushy puddles at every intersection!), but I've realized that I'd happily live in a snowy environment if I had an appropriate vehicle.

OR A SNOWMOBILE!!!
posted by elsietheeel at 7:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


There is no magic ability that allows somebody to drive competently on sheer ice.

Indeed, but... winter tires and ROCK SALT... dump salt on the road!! That's how we do it.
posted by coust at 7:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


Most of being good at driving in snow is knowing when not to go somewhere.

Well, today was my Annual Physical at 9am, which, if I skipped, would have cost $$$.

I don't drive, however, so I didn't have to worry about that.

I did have to waddle like a penguin for nearly the entire walk to get there, though, in order not to slip. Nordic walking poles helped immensely, and I didn't wipe out once. Even got there early.
posted by spinifex23 at 8:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


Seattlite here, can confirm, blew off work today to play in the snow with my kids and then take a nap.
posted by Joe Chip at 8:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]


dump salt on the road!! That's how we do it.

We prefer not to salt our own earth. Generous acceptance of snow days is a better strategy.

My first snowy winter here, I had an automatic Midwestern-kid response and popped out early to shovel my sidewalk. Did a couple of neighbors'! Got to the street corner and met a pair of crosscountry skiiers who were startled and sad and skritchy. We spent a little time on a plan to shovel only west and south sides of blocks, leaving the others for skiiers, but it had implementation details.

Years later I was hiking up to the grocery in an unusual snowfall and went down a few doors to ask a 70-year-old neighbor if she wanted anything. Met her coming the other way on snowshoes.
posted by clew at 8:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


I work in Portland on NW 23rd and live on NE 60th right off the MAX line. I got off work at 6 and transit shutdown and I still haven't gotten home yet (9:15). Gonna post up and eat ramen and figure it out later.

What's weird is how yesterday, when it was snowed out, it was declared a travel advisory. That's understandable, people in Portland don't know how to drive in the snow at all. Today, however, everything was iced over and it was a lot more dangerous. Today would have been the day to shut the city down. The MAX was messed up in the midst of Friday rush hour. There were landslides on 24th & Burnside that took power out. Oof.
posted by gucci mane at 9:18 PM on December 9, 2016


I'm a fairly recent Seattle transplant from California and this morning was the first time I'd ever driven in the snow in my life. It wasn't so bad! I took it slow and kept my cool. it was really no big deal. Then I read this thread in the afternoon and had a miniature panic attack about making it up my steep, icy driveway in my minivan. I ended up leaving work early because I couldn't think about anything else.

It went fine! Whew! But I'm glad this rain tonight is relatively warm. Melt, ice, melt!
posted by potrzebie at 9:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


Much too late to be useful -- but yes, as a Vancouverite who's also lived and driven in Toronto, Montreal, NYC and Saskatoon, the west coast is the worst place to drive in the snow, because

1) it's just warm enough to melt and re-freeze a thin sheet of ice under deceptive layer of snow
2) there's hills everywhere
3) it's a rain forest, so when that precipitation freezes it's a really heavy wet 12" dump of slush that doesn't happen anywhere else on the planet
4) no-one has snow tires, studs or chains and
5) every second driver is a snow virgin who thinks it's okay to tailgate, speed, accelerate to pass and/or drive at 10 klicks over the speed limit.

Seriously. Especially in the first snowfall of the year, drive careful. Drive slow. Drive like an 89 year old granny with with a grandchild in the back seat and a box of priceless heirloom crystal in the trunk, and you'll be fine.

Be raffish and insouciant, and you'll end up upside down in the ditch watching your wheels spin as you wonder exactly what you just managed to do.

And then you have to figure out how to get out of the seat belt without breaking your neck.
posted by jrochest at 10:31 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]


Yeah but none of y'all can drive in Hurricanes like Miamians!
posted by oddman at 10:32 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


I fondly remember that one time back in 2005 or so when I got in my car to drive to work, pulled out of my parking spot on a steep hill, and slid down an entire block of of E. Garfield St. on Capitol Hill. There had only been about a half inch of snow. The car came to rest gently where the street leveled out. On that day, I learned to respect small amounts of snow.
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 10:33 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


Today was a perfect storm (so to speak). Typically, heavy snow in Seattle = unexpected day off. Which is great! I am quite comfortable driving in snow, but the opportunity for a random day off where you aren't obligated to finish chores, take the kids to soccer, attend social events, etc is just *golden*. But both me and the wife are on call at the same time at our hospitals, which makes us "essential" employees. Our kids are 5 and 7 and a school closure creates an immediate and devastating need for child care.

This morning, I got up and out of the house at 5am, got to the hospital, rounded on all the patients and came home in the 4WD SUV in time to give the car to the wife to get to *her* hospital and round. Had time for a snowball fight with the kids and walked them over to a neighbor who drove them to school for their delayed start and then walked up to clinic and made it in time to see all the poor souls who were ill enough to venture out in the weather in search of medical care.

In defense of Seattleites, driving in 6 inches of unplowed slush is a totally different thing than driving in snow and I still don't know how safe this is or how to do it despite living here 18 years. What I do know is that the most dangerous part of my morning travels was the 3/4 mile walk uphill to clinic in which I nearly slipped and broke my hip a dozen times because of icy, slushy side walks.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 11:33 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]


I once had a real bad time driving in snow. I was in the Sierra Nevadas, heading down into the Sacramento Valley, in a 1985 Dodge Ram (RWD, no ABS). I was coming over a pass when it started to snow. There was a 500' cliff on my left. I slowed down to about 20 mph, which felt like a snail's pace on the highway. But it wasn't slow enough.

The road curved right, and when I turned the steering wheel, it had no effect and my truck kept going straight. Fortunately there was no one in the oncoming lane, but the only thing between my huge truck and that 500' drop was a dinky little guard rail. I was sure I would plow right through it but to my great relief I bounced off it like a pool ball. After taking a few minutes to calm down I continued at 5 mph.

Here's the location in Street View.
posted by foobaz at 12:27 AM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]


Unpopular opinion: AWD makes people bad drivers.

This is an extremely popular opinion. It's cut and pasted all over the Internet every winter. I think the number of people who are smug about not having AWD (or about understanding AWD better than the masses) may exceed the number of people who think AWD makes them invincible.
posted by Tehhund at 7:22 AM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]


Just to show everything is relative, as a Boston-trained and NYC-homed driver, about ten years ago I started driving regularly in Alaskan bush towns with unpaved gravel roads, plenty of actual non-road travel, and typically snow and ice everywhere from October to April, and it's dark and blowing snow a lot so you can't see much either except white.

I *still* get teased by Alaskan friends about being a "New York driver" (implying having insufficient experience of winter driving, and always being in a hurry) -- even having semi-mastered most of the tricks of getting around (typically in a 4x4 pickup on off-road tires and suspension) at a steady 8-10 mph. Last month I was driving a friend's Ford Explorer in RWD (warm fall and early winter meant roads were clear and gas is $6-7 a gallon and comes in twice a year by ship, so you *really* don't waste it there) when the first real snow came on the coast and I forgot to throw it into 4x4 after spending the day inside.

Everywhere I went the next day I heard "we heard you did some New York driving up by the church yesterday." Word gets around fast. I had fishtailed my way through two stop signs before I realized I had to hit the drive mode lever.

And of course you get passed left and right by elderly Native ladies on snow machines no matter what wheeled vehicle you're in.

At least where I go it's mostly flat (in town, the tundra is much less flat than most people realize, as my lower back can attest) except for graded driveways.

Someone ought to figure out a half-track-and-front-skis conversion that can be snapped onto the bottom of a Prius.
posted by spitbull at 8:07 AM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]


Obligatory Top Gear North Pole Special (modified Toyota HiLux vs dog team to the pole).
posted by spitbull at 8:16 AM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]


Indiana is one of the worst "states that should know better because we always get bad snows." Snow removal is largely theoretical outside of Indianapolis (and even they only do the main arteries.) The first good snow of the season is guaranteed to leave umpteen SUVs in ditches all along the interstates.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:14 PM on December 10, 2016


This is an extremely popular opinion. It's cut and pasted all over the Internet every winter. I think the number of people who are smug about not having AWD (or about understanding AWD better than the masses) may exceed the number of people who think AWD makes them invincible.

Having driven both in the snow, AWD sure is fun when you're trying to get moving (snowed in street parking for example, NEVER had to shovel my way out since I had an AWD vehicle with good clearance) but doesn't help at all when you're trying to stop, that's what winter tires and salt are for. It might be a bit better for handling, but for most people that would only be a benefit at low speed since most vehicles with AWD aren't AWD past 30 km/h (not Subarus though). And I've never thought it made much of a difference once the car was moving.
posted by coust at 1:02 PM on December 10, 2016


So I grew up in a snow belt in western Michigan (Grand Rapids -- 75 inches of snow per year, sez wiki), and took particular delight as a teen in finessing how to fishtail my car just right for it to slip around and zoom up our moderately-inclined driveway without hitting the curb. (Then I moved to Canada, and then to Chicago, which is actually the least snowy place I've lived.)

With my cred firmly established, I think it's totally okay for people who don't have much experience driving in snowy, cold and/or (particularly) icy just-below-freezing conditions to nope right out without feeling less virile. We're driving huge, dangerous machines around at breakneck speeds and if the weather conditions mean it's not safe to do so, then we shouldn't. People drive like idiots even when it's sunny and warm, and as a result thousands of innocent people die every year.

Goes doubly in areas like the PNW and the mid-South where municipalities are not prepared to put in the huge investment needed to make sure roads are safe in wintry conditions. I wouldn't fucking drive up some Seattle hill in a blizzard if I knew it wasn't properly plowed and salted. It's simply not worth it.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:30 PM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]


I'm originally from Seattle, and those hills are terrifying in slush and black ice. But I have to admit that after living in a climate for a decade that is very wintery and snowy, Seattalites do often have a bad habit of braking abruptly when something goes wrong with snow and/or ice driving, which of course just makes things worse. You might not be able to help sliding on ice, but what you do after you start to slide makes the difference between a bad crash and maybe just sliding a bit.
On a very positive note, I have the best memories of the whole city shutting down when the drab winter was broken up by even just a half inch of snow. No school, people cross country skiing down the middles of the neighborhood roads, and more than anything, all winter grumpiness would evaporate and folks would be so excited, talking to neighbors and strangers.
posted by branravenraven at 12:03 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]


I remember the snow days so fondly too! The people whose cars were set up for snow driving (skiiers, mostly) drove around volunteering rides, and a lot of cross-country skiiers got to work that way or ran errands, and SNOW DAY for the rest of us.
posted by clew at 12:58 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]


Indiana is one of the worst "states that should know better because we always get bad snows." Snow removal is largely theoretical outside of Indianapolis

I won the Indiana plowing lottery when I lived there -- on the same street the city keeps the plows, and therefore the very first street plowed in any snowstorm. Made winter biking a lot more doable.

Colorado apparently doesn't believe in plowing anything but interstate highways at all, which is almost OK if we just get a light dusting that evaporates in a couple of days. It is emphatically not OK when we get anything more than that, because the cars compress the show into a sheet of ice that won't melt quickly even when the temperatures rise. Combined with the lack of decent sidewalks and lack of shoveling enforcement (commercial landowners skate by, aided by sob stories about elderly or disabled homeowners), it's a lot harder to get around after a storm than it ever was in places I've lived that get more snow.

On especially heavy snow days, I get to work more reliably than my AWD-driving coworkers do by taking the bus. Biggest vehicle on the road, and most importantly, if anything happens, it's not my problem.
posted by asperity at 12:10 PM on December 11, 2016


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