South Pleasant Street overlook
If you had to travel anywhere this morning give thanks to Amherst Police, Fire, Dispatch and DPW highway and tree crews as they joined forces to deal with the aftermath of our first major storm of the season.
Amherst town center 7:05 AM
And for many of them, it was an "all nighter" of above and beyond the call of duty grunt work
Main Street looking east 7:10 AM
The heavy snow brought down trees and large limbs all over town, in many cases taking utility lines with them, although the power outages never came to close to the total devastation of the Halloween 2011 Snowmageddon storm.
Tree limb into house Farview Way, North Amherst
Tree limb Snell Street took out streetlight
A downed tree on Potwine Lane knocked out power to less than 200 homes in South Amherst and a huge limb crashed into a house on Farview Way, but did not cause any injuries or serious structural damage.
#Amherst town offices to close at noon because of the storm (will anyone notice?). Does not include APD, AFD, or DPW of course.
— Larry Kelley (@amherstac) November 26, 2014
PVTA bus caused traffic tie up at The Notch yesterday during the storm
DPW clearing Town center during height of the storm
This was the non-school, non-CPA part of our town budget in action, while we slept, the part that we (except for Larry) take for granted.
ReplyDeleteAnd this is the part of the budget that certain Town Meeting members like to squawk about, claiming that they could be more efficient, saving more money, using smaller vehicles, running the vehicles they have longer etc., so we can spend more money on acquiring more conservation land, historic properties, barns, and so on.
ReplyDelete....comments and complaints which would be noticed in town if anyone were paying attention.
I am thankful that we have the DPW, police, fire, and emergency services we have, given our TM's willingness to strangle them.
Yes, thank you to DPW and Public Safety!!
ReplyDeleteAlso, thanks to Nancy Pagano who is finishing her 40th time of cooking Thanksgiving dinner for elders and others. She does not get paid to do this and she was at the Bangs Center at 5 a.m. this morning cooking turkeys. Clean up may be done by 5 p.m. tonight.
We have a lot of dedicated Town employees who go well beyond the call of duty. I am so proud to call them my friends, neighbors, and co-workers.
Thank you,Larry, for reminding us how much we have to be thankful for.
Thank you very much for your service to town, country, friend and stranger alike.
ReplyDeleteI was out in it Wednesday evening, as the worst of it was winding down, and the DPW folks were clearing up the mess. I completely agree that they are consistently asked to do more, and the budget axe frequently falls against the needs of that department, as well as public safety. Thanks are consistently due for all those times their family and concerns are put on hold for our greater good.
ReplyDeleteThanks to you all- it's much appreciated that we can get out and about, that you come when we call, and are there at our need.
~ Shelley Svoboda
Larry,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the shout out, now off to bed.