It's Getting Cold

As winter slowly approaches here are a few facts about winter in Toronto.

1. The snowiest day was on December 11th, 1944 with 48.3 cm of snowfall. The City was shut down, all traffic except emergency vehicles was banned from the streets.  The armed forces cleared the roads and sidewalks.  Home deliveries of milk, ice and fuel were cancelled and funerals postponed.
2. Statistically Toronto has a 57% chance of having a White Christmas, according to Environment Canada.  Snow does fall before Christmas, but most of it falls from mid Janaury to March. However, over the last 170 years, it has always snowed in Toronto after the first day of Spring.
3. Early in 1999 a series of snowstorms hit the City, with the first and the worst arriving on January 2nd, dumping somewhere between 20-40 cm of snow.  Four more storms followed, dropping a record 118 cm of snow in 12 days, which was 4 cm more than the average annual for the city. The Mayor at the time, Mel Lastman called in the military and more than 400 troops arrived to get the City moving again. Snowstorms are extremely expensive to clear.  Toronto usually spends $65 million annually on snow removal, by the end of January 1999 the snow had cost the City $70 million!

 Now what would Ford do? Forget the gravy train, what about the snow plows?