Private company snowblowing in the middle of the night

[Bob_McBob]

Snow Removal Noise By-Law

Around 4:30am a guy from a private snow removal company showed up to snowblow my neighbour's rear deck and very large driveway. I'm sure you know how loud snowblowers are to begin with. He also managed to hit the side of the house several times, making a huge racket that woke up everyone. I went out to talk to him and he told me it's perfectly legal for him to do it whenever he wants, and his clients get up at 5 and need their driveways cleared. He was extremely condescending and told me to call the police if I wanted. He's now doing several driveways across the street.

I checked the Waterloo noise by-law and the only snow removal exemption I see is for plows operated by or for the city. Am I missing something?

Off to try and get more sleep...

[Bob_McBob]

I looked more and it seems like motorized snow removal equipment is specifically exempt from the noise by-law:


13. The operation of any powered or non-powered tool for domestic purposes other than snow removal.

So anyone can run a snowblower whenever they feel like it, 24/7?

[IEFBR14]

I live in a condo townhouse development. Our snowplow arrived at 04:30 this morning. Not only is it a huge monster who motor and plow scraping on the pavement makes lots of noise, but it also has a very loud backup beeper.

At least when I get woken up it's because my own driveway is being cleared but it adds insult to injury that I'm also paying for the wake-up call.

[Osiris]

That's life in Canada, especially in an increasingly densely populated metropolis full of parking. The last two places I've lived (High rise apartment and condo complex) had the plows going early - and most nights at the apartment building we'd be woken @ 2AM and 5AM by the plows coming acting like IEFBR mentioned.

I also had the fortunate luck of living by a grocery store that was scheduled to have their large parking lot plowed most nights at 3AM - that took a while.

The plow scraping was one thing - but the backup beeping is so much worse, especially as it isn't even accomplishing anything from a snow removal standpoint, and there's no one around for the beep to benefit.

[IEFBR14]

The plow scraping was one thing - but the backup beeping is so much worse, especially as it isn't even accomplishing anything from a snow removal standpoint, and there's no one around for the beep to benefit.Yeah, that's my main peeve too. That and the operator who lets the plow blade drop hard on the pavement. Not only does that make a loud noise and sometimes even shakes the house slightly but I imagine it damages the pavement and will require an expensive repaving job ahead of schedule.

I suspect the backup beeper must drive the plow operator mad as well, especially as you say there's no one around who needs to hear it, but probably as a safety precaution there's no easy way for the driver to turn it off.

[Urbanomicon]

I suspect the backup beeper must drive the plow operator mad as well, especially as you say there's no one around who needs to hear it, but probably as a safety precaution there's no easy way for the driver to turn it off.

It is coupled to his gear shifter. Whenever the vehicle is put into reverse (moving or not) the beeper will sound until it is taken out of reverse.

As for inside the vehicle, I suspect the noise and vibration from the plough would be much louder than the back-up beeper.

[bzmwillemsen]

I currently live in the Park Place Complex and Grand River Hospital plows their parking lots at around midnight->1am which gets very annoying as they do it every night. What's most annoying about it is that I can hear it and I'm 2 blocks away!

[Bob_McBob]

As crappy as it is for people living nearby, I guess can understand why parking lots need to be plowed at night, since it's the only time they're empty. Using a snowblower in the middle of the night in a suburb is a lot different from a plow company that can clear a driveway in 30 seconds with a couple of passes, though.

I am used to city plows coming at night, so I don't think I would have noticed he was just clearing normal driveways. Unfortunately my neighbour has a very long driveway to a garage set back behind the house, as well as a completely paved back yard with a pool. The entire thing was cleared with a regular snowblower, and must have taken at least 30 minutes. He also managed to hit the side of the house with snow several times, right under the bedroom windows, which is probably what woke up everyone.

It seems like Ontario communities either have this exact by-law with the same wording, or else specifically prohibit snowblowers (as opposed to plows) from being operated at night. I don't see any sort of reasonable decibel level defined in our by-law, so I guess you can make absolutely as much noise as you want, whenever you want, as long as you're clearing snow.

It's weird, I've been living here for 15 years and I've never had a snow removal company come so early. Given how annoyed people are even about snowblowing at 5:45am before work (http://forums.redflagdeals.com/neighbour-hates-my-snowblower-562008/), it just seems like common courtesy to not hire someone to do it for you in the middle of the night.