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December 13, 2007

Update: Gridlock and hours-long slogs grip the state

Gridlock is gripping Providence. Forty-minute journeys through East Bay are stretching beyond three hours. Cars are spinning in East Providence. The season's first storm is punching Rhode Island hard.

A mass exodus of cars out of the capital city has been under way for hours, with businesses dismissing people early because of the storm. And that exodus is at a crawl, with slippery conditions creating lots of accidents on the roads, with some people reporting waiting hours just to get from city streets onto highways.

The Providence Department of Public Works has nearly 70 plows on the road, including those from private vendors, Mayor David N. Cicilline's office announced. "However, road conditions remain treacherous as snowfall continues into the evening. Mayor Cicilline advises residents to stay off the roads so that plow operators can make the streets safe for travel," the mayor's news release said.

In Providence' s Kennedy Plaza, a woman said she and many others had been waiting for two hours for a bus that had not yet come.

In Pawtucket, the snowstorm wreaked havoc. Major roads, such as Broadway, turned into parking lots as people were let out of work early, causing traffic jams. A privately owned sander truck broke down on School Street. The resulting backup made the situation worse.

Pawtucket Highway Supt. Ronald J. Leitao said a major contributor to the problem was the elaborate truck detours that the state DOT put into place when a 22-ton weight limit was posted on the Pawtucket River Bridges, between Exits 27 and 28 on Route 95, two weeks ago. Heavy truck traffic diverted through the city between those exits was intensifying the traffic jams, Leitao said, making it difficult for the plows to move.

“We’re in a little predicament,” Leitao said, speaking by cell phone from a truck stuck in traffic on Broadway at 3 p.m. “Our trucks are in their routes, but they’re just moving slow because of the detours and being stuck in traffic.”

Leitao, who could see Route 95 from where he was sitting, said that it, too, looked like a parking lot. The city’s private weather service was predicting 6 inches of snow by 6 p.m., he said. With all the traffic, Leitao said, it won’t be until 6 p.m. that city snowplows will be able to plow the streets.

An on-street parking ban went into effect at 1 p.m., but it wasn’t making much of a difference.

Three more parking bans have been announced: Two go into force at 5 p.m. in Providence and Barrington. The Providence ban is in effect through 6 a.m. tomorrow. Another ban in in effect immediately in Seekonk, Mass. People must get cars and trucks off roads so that plows can clear them.

For numerous parking bans and their start times in communities around the state, check here.
Providence police traffic division said East Side streets, with their steep hills, are particularly slippery.

And here's some proof: Providence police responded to a school bus that apparently slid on Cypress Street, a steep East Side road. No injuries were reported. There was also an accident at Abbott and Knowles streets, near Cypress.

You really don't want to drive anywhere -- take it from some people who have and others who still are.

A Journal reporter traveling north on Route 114 in Middletown-Portsmouth reports very slippery conditions even at the lowest speeds. She's been on the road back to Providence from Newport for three hours. She said that cars pull over for a time, then resume the crawl.

Traffic was slinking on Route 136 heading through Bristol. In East Providence's Rumford section, a particularly nasty stretch is Pawtucket Avenue, where cars appeared to have spun out in front of Newman Congregational Church. A half-mile down from that, a man was helping some young women whose Mercedes appeared to have spun out near where Pawtucket Avenue and Newport Avenue meet.

Another reporter, heading from Bristol to Pawtucket, found that a normally half-hour journey was running past one hour and 20 minutes -- and she wasn't home yet. Still, during that journey, two men could be seen looking at a Christmas tree in a lot next to the Eskimo King ice cream spot in Swansea, Mass.

Lanes were indiscernible on a stretch of Route 195 west from Massachusetts into Rhode Island.

A journey from downtown Providence to the Pascoag section of Burrillville in the state's northwest corner endured for one hour and 45 minutes instead of the usual 40 minutes or so at midday. Much of the delay was simply getting onto Fountain Street in Providence and then up to Route 146 north, with treacherous ramps. Driving Route 146 north was about a 10 mph pace at first but got up to about 30 mph as drivers neared the North Smithfield line. Few accidents were seen on the route -- but one gasoline tanker flew by at perhaps 45 mph.

However, Route 146 south from Mineral Spring Avenue into Providence was a parking lot this afternoon.

North Central State Airport on the Lincoln-Smithfield border has been closed, said Paul Smith, airport operations manager.

"We're fighting a losing battle here now," he said. "We go down the runway [clearing it] and when we go back up it's already covered again."

Smith said the airport will wait for the snow to stop then plow all at once. He said the airport currently expects to open by tomorrow morning at the latest.

Rhode Islanders, lore says, should have done a milk-and-bread run by now. But one man had more exuberant choices.

Journal staff writer Alisha A. Pina's mother Penny was at the Stop & Shop on Newport Avenue in East Providence near the Pawtucket border. A man in line behind her had a bag of apples and proclaimed: "I'm gonna make me a pie!"

It began snowing in Providence late this morning. By early afternoon, the snow was piling up around the state.

The snow, which began in South County before 11 a.m., is expected to drop 5 to 10 inches across southern New England.

Check out live local radar and track the storm.

Some schools have already canceled classes, and parking bans are in force in many towns.

For more weather and regular updates, see projo.com/weather.

The brunt of the snow storm is expected to hit during the evening commute. The trucks have pre-treated highways with a mixture of one part salt, to lower the freezing temperature of water, and one part sand, for traction and to keep the ice crystals from forming.

“We’re basically trying to keep everything as open as possible during the evening commute,” said Baker. “Hopefully, everything will be going smoothly at that point.”

Shortly after noon, for instance, lottery corporation GTECH dismissed people from its Rhode Island offices if they chose to head home to avoid the storm's brunt, security there said.

In state government, the Department of Administration, which oversees people working in the executive branch, is carrying out an adverse weather policy in which state employees can take unused vacation, personal leave or leave without pay today.

Providence City Hall closed at 3 p.m.

-- projo.com staff writers Michael P. McKinney and Brandie Jefferson, with reports from Journal staff writers Karen Lee Ziner, John Castellucci, G. Wayne Miller, Meaghan Wims, C. Eugene Emery Jr., John Hill, and Katie Mulvaney

Posted by Mike McKinney  at 4:00 PM | Permalink

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joe shlabotnik | December 13, 2007 2:17 PM link

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