The first significant snowfall of the year has come and gone mostly without incident, Ontario Provincial Police say.
The snow began falling late Thursday afternoon and continued overnight before beginning to taper off at around 5 a.m.
Speaking with CP24 on Friday morning, Ontario Provincial Police Sgt. Kerry Schmidt said that there has not been a significant uptick in collisions as a result of the messy weather but he said that drivers should nonetheless use caution.
“Most drivers got an A plus but we do have a few drivers that failed the grade,” he said. “We are not dealing with a lot of ice – the salt has done the job – and I just hope that all of a sudden when we get to that congestion the people who are driving realize that their stopping distances will be a little bit longer with these wet conditions.”
Schmidt said that there were about a dozen crashes on OPP-patrolled roads in the Toronto area overnight, mostly involving single drivers.
A GO train that was headed back to GO Transit’s Willowbrook Yard also collided with a snow plow that was left on the tracks near Clarkson Road and Lakeshore Road in Mississauga at around 2 a.m. but no injuries were reported as a result.
Meanwhile, police in Toronto say that they have responded to 156 calls for property damage collisions and 89 calls for personal injury collisions over the last 24 hours.
Included in those collisions was a fail-to-remain crash near Caledonia and Rogers roads overnight in which a driver slammed into a light pole amid slippery conditions.
“Drive according to the conditions, leave yourself some extra time and pack your patience because you are going to need it on a morning like today,” TPS Sgt. Alex Crews told CP24 on Friday morning.
While snowfall totals are not known at this point, Environment Canada had been predicting between five and 10 centimetres for the GTA.
According to Toronto’s superintendent of road operations Mark Mills, salt trucks completed three rounds on the city’s main arterial roadways and expressways, two rounds on its collector roads and one round on its local roads overnight. He said that sidewalk plows were also deployed at around 4 a.m. “to take care of that little but of slush that is on the sidewalks.”
Despite the relatively small snowfall total, the Canadian Automobile Association (CAA) told CP24 on Friday morning that it is bracing for a high volume of service calls as drivers adjust to the slippery conditions.
CAA Spokesperson Kaitlynn Furse said that as many as 3,000 calls will likely come in across the GTA, including an estimated 1,000 in Toronto proper.
She said that drivers should fill up their gas tanks and try to keep to the main roads, especially in the morning hours.
She said that is also important to drive to the conditions,
“Don’t use cruise control, keep your full attention on the road and make sure that you are slowing down and leaving yourself enough time,” she said.
The city had been under a winter weather advisory but Environment Canada lifted that advisory at around 5 a.m.
School bus cancellations
School buses have been cancelled for the day in some jurisdictions due to the winter weather.
All Halton District School Board and Halton Catholic District School Board buses in Zone 3
All Trillium Lakelands District School Board buses to schools in Kawartha Lakes and Haliburton.
