What We Heard: Sidewalk Snow Clearing Public Engagement

The City of St. John’s has released the findings of the public engagement process on sidewalk snow clearing.

Council and staff recognize there is a voice within the community advocating for improved service in sidewalk snow clearing. The key decision point for Council to consider is how to improve the service in a way that is effective and cost efficient, and to assist with that decision, it is important to understand what the public feels the key issues are and where improvements may have the greatest impact.

A variety of tools were used to gather feedback, including:

• Meetings with the City’s advisory committees including Youth, Seniors and Inclusion
• Meetings with key stakeholders including Downtown St. John’s, the Board of Trade, Metrobus, the NL English School District and Empower
• A project page with a mapping tool and links to surveys for both the public and businesses
• Virtual public sessions
• Social media engagement
• Email and Access St. John’s feedback 

With more than 3,000 touchpoints, engagement on this topic was extensive.

Through a mapping feature at engagestjohns.ca, residents were given the opportunity to identify specific areas of concern, where they felt improvements are needed and also places where they felt sidewalk snow clearing was not necessary.

The public online survey had 1,019 total responses.

Following discussion of this What We Heard Document on August 19, 2020 at Committee of the Whole, the report will be shared internally and externally with the public and those who participated in the process.

To read the detailed  ‘What We Heard’ document and all feedback, go to engagestjohns.ca.