Feb 08 2010
Nowhere for the snow to go
Monday classes were cancelled because of snow and now so are Tuesday’s classes. Of course for me it makes no difference since I do research. [UPDATE: WEDNESDAY CLASSES CANCELLED!]
I wouldn’t be surprised if Wednesday classes are also cancelled. The sad truth is this:
1. It’s going to snow again on Tuesday.
2. The existing snow isn’t melting. You can plow the roads all you want, but the snow ain’t going anywhere. If you plow the roads, you screw over the sidewalks. If you plow the sidewalks, you screw over the roads. Until the temperature rises enough for the snow to melt, it isn’t going anywhere. At best you can compress it.
3. Good luck on getting the temperature high enough. There’s so much snow lying around and so much latent heat that needs to be removed from the snow before it even melts.
4. Even when it finally melts, then what? It isn’t going to all melt at once unless the temperature becomes dramatically warmer. The snow is going to melt during the day and re-freeze during the night. And what do you get on the road? Solid ice. Plowing the roads doesn’t do jack because the plowed snow melts and re-freezes on the road. Good luck plowing solid ice.
5. Even if it all melts at once, wow, it’s going to suck to be a pedestrian. Mad slush everywhere.
UPDATE: Okay, this is rather depressing…
