Two days removed from working 32 straight hours clearing snow and dropping 200 tons of salt on the streets of Collinsville, the street department set about digging Main Street businesses out of the snow.

Snow removed from Main Street, Collinsville / Photo by Roger Starkey

Bert’s Chuckwagon after street crews removed snow from Main Street / Photo by Roger Starkey

Bert’s Chuckwagon in the snow / Photo by Roger Starkey

Crews spent 16 hours Wednesday and Thursday removing approximately 945 cubic yards of snow from eight blocks of Main Street in uptown Collinsville. Many businesses had snow drifting against the buildings before the clean-up, Collinsville Director of Streets Rod Cheatham said.

Business owners were nearly paralyzed by the 12.5 inches of snow the city received overnight Saturday and during the day Sunday, Cheatham said. Among the equipment used to haul off 95 dump truck-loads of snow was two snow blowers, two skid steers (like a miniature bull dozer), a backhoe, a front-end loader and a motor grader.

Motor graders are typically used to level roads during construction, but they were pressed into service in a new capacity. “They are actually a fantastic snow removal tool,” Cheatham said.

The snow was taken to a location owned by the City of Collinsville on Mulberry Street, just east of Lebanon Road.

The last time a large snow removal project took place in uptown Collinsville was sometime in the early 1980s, Cheatham said.