This project is upgrading City snow storage facilities to improve environmental performance and site drainage.

Project Update - March 2023

Upgrades at the Kennedale snow storage facility will start in 2023 to align with other work ongoing at this location. 

Future closures at other snow storage facilities will be communicated once a complete project timeline is finalized.

Project Overview

The City of Edmonton operates five snow storage facilities. Four of these sites are open for public use. This project will update these facilities to improve environmental performance and site drainage as part of the City’s initiative to build in climate change resiliency. 

This project involves redesign of several snow storage facilities to improve snow storage capacity and control snow melt, focusing on changes to the snow pad surfaces, ditches and settling pond. Facilities with clay surfaces create a high mass of sediment in the snow storage ponds, resulting in increased operational costs and increased risk of contaminants released into the environment.

Through this project, the clay surfaces will be replaced with asphalt. In addition, telecommunications infrastructure will be installed to allow for monitoring of facility usage, as well as to support the possibility of implementing future tipping, or usage fees. Electrical upgrades will be made to support permanent site lighting, the drainage system and pumps, future video monitoring and site access control systems.

Benefits of these upgrades include: 

  • Improvements to environmental sustainability and responsibility with hard surfacing and settling pond upgrades
  • Improvements to operational efficiency, responsiveness and overall site management
  • Improved quality of water released from these sites
  • Increases in snow storage capacity
  • Customer service improvements by enabling more reliable and safer access to the sites
  • Improved site and user monitoring to support operations and administration