Boston's Snow Removal Price Tag: $50 Million
BOSTON (CBS) -- The cost of removing thousands of truckloads of snow from Boston this winter is expected to reach $50 million, Mayor Marty Walsh says.
Appearing on WBZ NewsRadio 1030's NightSide With Dan Rea, the mayor said that's well more than double what the city planned for this year.
"We budgeted about $18 million," Walsh said. "We're probably at about $45 million that we've paid on snow removal, probably going to head toward $50 million."
Boston is only 2 inches of snow shy of breaking the record for all-time snowiest winter. This season's total of 105.7 inches has cost the regional economy an estimated $1 billion and crippled public transportation.
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Just how hard is it to get rid of nearly 9 feet of snow? According to Walsh, the city has cleared 1 billion cubic feet of snow, which is double the amount of dirt removed from the Big Dig project over a 15-year period.
"We've taken 30,000 truckloads of snow off the street, we've melted over 50,000 tons of snow," he said. "We've plowed 263,000 miles of roadway."
Walsh said he's hoping there are lessons to be learned from a historically harsh winter.
"We're looking at how do we remove snow in the city of Boston, particularly snow like this," he said. "Some of those ideas that we've learned we'll be able to use and hopefully save money next year as far as snow removal goes."
WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Karen Twomey reports:
