1735 Monadnock Block, Chicago, Ill.

Up to the time of the advent of the automobile in sufficient numbers to demand respectable attention, the South Park Commissioners did not follow a policy of cleaning snow off drives in the parks and on the boulevards; in fact, the snow was purposely left on the drives to provide sleighing for the public. Some twelve years ago, however, about 1906,-the Park Commissioners started the practice of plowing the snow off drives to provide safer travel for the greatly increasing number of autoists. The equipment used for this purpose at that time was horse-drawn road grading machines.

When a fall of snow was four inches or less, we sent out ten plows,-five left-hand plows and five right-hand plows,-on a fiftyfoot driveway, the idea being to bring all of the snow from the center of a drive to the gutters. When a snowfall was more than four inches and less than eight inches we started one of the plows drawn by four horses near the gutter to throw the first cut of snow on to the planting space or edge of the sidewalk, then followed with four other plows working from the center to the gutter.

Later the plan of plowing the snow from the gutters to the center of a drive was adopted, but there were several reasons why we abandoned this method of snow cleaning;-one reason being that because of the automobiles, milk wagons and other vehicles standing along the curbs it was impossible to get the snow cleaned along the gutters; another reason was that when the ridge of snow in the center of the street began melting the water ran towards the gutters, sometimes freezing before reaching them and thereby coating the drive surfaces with ice, which made it quite dangerous for traveling; a third reason being that it was ever so much harder work for the teams, inasmuch as they were plowing uphill from gutter to the crown of the drive.

*Superintendent of Maintenance and Repairs, South Park Commissioners.

The most unusual weather conditions with the abnormal snowstorms of the present winter have brought forcibly to our attention the inadequacy of the ordinary snow-handling equipment in such times of great need, and the pressing necessity for further development of machines and methods that can be depended upon to respond promptly and efficiently to any calls that may be made upon them in the line or snow removal service.

All will without doubt readily agree that the amount of snowfall during the January storms was most extraordinary, the records of the Weather Bureau giving the total snowfall for the month as 42.5 inches, the greatest for any one month in Chicago in the history of the Bureau, which was established about 1873. Another feature quite unusual about this great snowfall was that storm followed storm in fairly rapid succession after the first heavy blizzard of January, making it quite impossible, with the means at our disposal, to get things opened up in the intervals between them. And then as the storms were accompanied by high winds the snow was blown about, ground up very finely and drifted into banks that were at some places six or more feet deep.

The South Park Commissioners did the best they possibly could with the men and equipment at their command, but did not succeed in making much headway against the overwhelming odds. Under such unlooked for conditions it will hardly evoke much wonder that it only too soon became painfully evident that all the snow cleaning equipment on hand proved entirely inadequate to make any considerable and reasonably rapid progress in opening the badly blocked walks and drives to the traveling public, which was never so sorely in need of open thoroughfares as at that very time.

In this connection I will mention the fact that it was very clearly demonstrated to me how necessary it is to have the boulevards in first class condition after a big storm. During the heavy January storms the auto traffic coming north on Michigan Avenue turned west on reaching Twelfth Street to Wabash Avenue and then following the Wabash Avenue car tracks north to the loop. I heard from quite a number of autoists that it required an hour or longer in most cases to travel on Wabash Avenue from 12th Street to Madison Street on account of the congestion of the traffic. The Street Car Company deserves a great deal of credit for their efforts to open and keep opened the various car lines which furnished a means for the traveling public to get around on their business where outside streets were practically impassable.

PLOWS MEET WATERLOO

All of the special motor snow plows of the South Park Commissioners, those equipped with V-shaped plows, from which we could usually expect fairly rapid and efficient service in ordinary snowfalls, met their Waterloo in the January storms, became stalled