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Metromelt
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Wed Nov 29 2000 at 2:21:14
Metromelt is the is the old name for one of five
snow
melting
machines owned and occasionally operated by
The Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto
. They have recently been renamed as the Toronto Snow Melting Machines, as
amalgamation
has caused the city to eliminate the word
Metro
from its vocabulary.
Melting up to 136
tonnes
of snow per hour, the
Sherman Tank
of
snow removal
assists the city on major arteries after a
heavy snowfall
or
ice storm
. Similar to the machinery used at airports to deice airport runways during cold
weather
, the machines take in snow,
heat
and
agitate
it with a powerful
diesel engine
until it's melted. From there, water is drained into
sewers
.
Metromelt measures 17.4
m
long, 3.9m high, 3.1m wide and has a ground clearance of 27
cm
. It weighs 42.6 tonnes, but its
weight
increases to 56 tonnes when at full
capacity
. When operating, Metromelt spans and clears an entire and is often followed by
Bobcat
haulers that
shovel
the rest into
dump truck
s.
The city brought the first machine into service back in the
1970s
and I
vague
ly remember seeing them around as a
child
. Not many people I know can
recall
them but I remember they were painted
yellow
(which contained
lead
and is
no longer used
) and
dingy
back then. I often thought that my
memory
of the machines was
fiction
al and I was somehow too-interested in
heavy equipment
for my own good.
When I saw one again during
the snow storm of '99
, I was immediately relieved of my fears. It was melting snow while I was on my way home in
the middle of the night
. I could see the
flashing blue lights
of the city's efforts from far away but as I walked toward their
slow progress
, I walked into one of the strangest feelings of
deja-vu
.
A
convoy
of
tow trucks
sat waiting in the path of the operation, pulling cars out of
snowbank
s and out of the way of the Metromelt. It
trudge
d along slowly but noisily eating
four foot
snowbanks and
belching diesel exhaust
and I stopped to watch the melter, the tow trucks, the Bobcats and the
dump truck
s work. Despite the biting cold, it was fascinating and one of my faintest memories was relived in their tuned melting routine.
Manufacturer's Photo:
http://www.trecan.com/snowmelt/Metromelt.html
Photo and Civic Use Information:
http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/roads/torontomelt.htm
printable version
chaos
-40 Celsius
Megacity
The Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto
Canadian Winter
The Brighter Side of Winter in Toronto
Caught in a snow storm
The Long Winter
Automat
Snow job
Shoveling snow
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