The Great Blizzard of 2011 came and went, but it left Chicago pretty dry: the snow removal during and after the blizzard last month cost the city $37.3 million to clean up. The Chicago Tribune reports that this number is more than double what the mayor and the city had set aside for snow removal during the entire year. more ›

From the "strike while the iron's hot" department: Cran's is reporting that Gov. Quinn sent a formal request to President Obama to have 60 counties in Illinois declared federal disaster areas as a result of last month's Blizzaster and, thus, qualify for disaster relief funding if approved. more ›

The city may have abolished the Hired Truck Program six years ago, but its legacy will always be invoked every time something happens to remind us of it. Events like, oh, Blizzaster 2011. The Sun-Times reports that three companies with ties to the Hired Truck Scandal were among those receiving the $8 million in emergency snow removal contracts that were doled out by the city. more ›

Sure, the thaw that's expected to hit the area may make clearing the sidewalks a moot point this weekend, but it's still a violation of city law not to shovel your sidewalks and walkways. As our former "Ask Chicagoist" columnist Thales Exoo pointed out a few years back, section 10--8-180 of the city Municipal Code states: more ›

Did you know there was a crippling blizzard in Chicago a few days ago? Although it appears that most roads are pretty clear and the CTA is running close to normal, a lot of the Chicago side streets have been waiting patiently to be cleared by the city. more ›

Chair Free Chicago (remember them) announced this morning they were organizing a "shovel out" in Bridgeport in an attempt to advocate helping each other dig out from the Blizzaster and promote their dibs-free mission. more ›

We know that the dibs system here in Chicago has stayed the same for decades and regardless of how you feel about marking that space you spent all day digging out, city officials are okay with dibs, for now at least. The Tribune reports Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Thomas Byrne saying of dibs, “At this moment, that's a thing they're (residents) doing and they're trying to save what they dug out and we're not going to take a position on that.” more ›

The immediate response to Lake Shore Drive aside, the city has actually done a good job of snow removal during this week's blizzard. As the days pass, residents throughout Chicago are starting to adopt a "what have you done for me lately" approach towards clearing the side streets and especially the 2,000 miles of alleys. I took the above photo of the scene in the alley behind my apartment building an hour ago. That's a six-foot high wall of snow created by neighbors whose immediate focus was getting the area around their garages cleared. more ›

The cleanup from the Blizzard of 2011 continues. Lake Shore Drive, which had 239 cars still stranded on it as of 5 p.m. yesterday, is now cleared and open to traffic. Motorists who had to strand their cars on Lake Shore Drive during the height of the storm Tuesday night should call 311 to find the location of their vehicles. The city's Streets and Sanitation department towed all vehicles to parking lots near the Drive at Wells, Chicago, Belmont, Wilson, Foster and Soldier Field. The city has set up a database so motorists can find their cars. Security details have been set up at each lot to help ensure that no one's coming to jack your car. Since these towings were weather-related emergencies, motorists stranded on Lake Shore Drive will not be charged for them. more ›

By now, only the truly ignorant are unaware that we're supposed to get a lot of snow. Most of the meteorologists in town are predicting up to two feet of snow between 3 p.m. this afternoon and 3 p.m. tomorrow afternoon. That's predicted to be coupled with gusting winds of up to 50 MPH, creating possible whiteout conditions we haven't seen in these parts in quite some time. The National Weather Service is calling the coming storm a “dangerous, multifaceted and life-threatening winter storm,” rivaling the Blizzards of 1967, 1979 and 1999. more ›

Most of the news about O'Hare hasn't been too great as of late. That makes today's news all the cheerier. The airport was awarded the 2009-10 Balchen/Post Award for its ability to clear snow off of runways in the "Large" commercial airport category, an honor it shares with Washington D.C.'s Dulles which faced a pretty stiff blast of winter this year. The award, sponsored by The Northeast Chapter of the American Association of Airport Executives and handed out at The International Aviation Snow Symposium, is the first such honor for O'Hare since 1999. O'Hare received 50 inches of snow, over a foot above its normal tally. Previous wins for the airport came in 1978, 1988, and 1989. However, the airport remains winless in its bid to win a Montgomery Burns Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence. more ›

• A hearing date of March 10 has been set in the battle over Medill's Innocence Project and the involvement in the Anthony McKinney case.
• Indications are that the Supreme Court will rule in favor of black firefighters who have sued the City of Chicago.
• Bones were discovered at a Gold Coast construction site and authorities are trying to determine if they're human.

With a bit of Chicago braggadocio, Bob Richardson, Deputy Commissioner of the Bureau of Street Operations -- the department responsible for snow removal -- said that the recent massive snowfalls on the East Coast wouldn't phase him or his crew one bit, calling it "nothing." He told the Associated Press that "[He would] take [his] plow drivers and put them up against anyone in North America." (While we don't doubt Chicago would beat Mexico, the Canadians may have an edge.) more ›

As we learned yesterday, this past weekend's brief warm-up was just that - a brief warm-up. We've still got months of winter left. But that means we also have plenty of chances to remove snow from cars just as this gentleman does. more ›

At this morning's City Council meeting, concerned aldermen will get to address their complaints about the city's snow plowing (or lack thereof) to the Mayor's aides in charge of snow removal. Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Michael Picardi and Transportation Commissioner Thomas Byrne will face the Council's Transportation Committee, which is headed by Ald. Tom Allen (36th), the most vocal critic of the Mayor's new snow removal plan that abandoned side-street plowing to (allegedly) save money. However, Allen is back-pedaling now, saying the issue “has kind of become a moot issue since the experiment failed and they’re back to a common-sense approach. They’ve returned back to normal snow removal.” more ›