Courtesy of rochester.edu
Rochester prepared last weekend for what was anticipated to be the worst snow storm in recent years. Horticulture and Grounds, UR’s own A-team, took up the gauntlet, and efficiently so.
University property — including the River Campus, UR Medical Center, and Eastman School of Music — comprises over six million square feet of roads, parking lots, and sidewalks, all of which must be plowed. According to Horticulture and Grounds Manager Dan Schied, the River Campus plowing cycle alone is six hours. And that’s just after one pass.
“It snowed about six inches on Friday and another six overnight,” Schied said. “I was pleased to find Saturday morning that almost every part of campus had been serviced.”
Besides the sheer expanse of UR’s sprawling properties, the volume of snow needed to move is staggering. Schied, who’s worked with the University for two decades, explained that one inch of snow on University property would fill the football field in Fauver Stadium with a block 11-feet tall or fill ten-cubic-yard dump trucks stretching nine miles. Whew.
While his team was able to successfully plow the vast majority of campus, Schied explained that UR does have countermeasures in place to provide for all possible contingencies. In the event a snowplow breaks down or snowfall is particularly heavy, Horticulture and Grounds has a list of third-party contractors from which to dispatch. There is also a backup fleet of snowplows on 24-hour standby.
Keeping UR clear of snow is no easy task, but Horticulture and Grounds and their team of plowers did so with flying colors.
