Ever since Mayor Michael Bilandic lost reelection to Jane Byrne after the great blizzard of 1979 paralyzed Chicago, snowplowing has been a highly political matter in our city.
Here at the Reader we were curious about exactly how the city manages to clear the major streets so efficiently after a major snow event. So I checked in with Commissioner John Tully of the Department of Streets and Sanitation, which spearheads plowing efforts on a route system of more than 9,400 lane miles, to get the skinny. Tully started with the department 24 years ago and moved up the ranks until he made department chief a year ago.
The early-morning November 26 storm was initially pegged as a Phase II event based on weather forecasts the evening prior, so Streets and San responded by sending out the predetermined 211 trucks. (In addition to tracking storms via Doppler radar and checking in with meteorologists, sensors embedded in roads near eleven Chicago bridges provide data on ground and air temperatures in key locations.)
Streets and San leads the city’s responses to major storms from “Snow Command” at OEMC’s headquarters, 1411 West Madison. “Each department has a desk, so instead of having to make phone calls to coordinate, [staffers are] sitting right there,” Tully said.
“I don’t think the whole story’s been told,” Tully said, referring to the plowing scandal. He noted that in recent years a new high school and elementary school opened a few blocks east of Burke’s house on 51st Street, and argued that plow drivers may have been using the street as a turnaround. “I don’t think we had anything to hide there.”
