Good Samaritan Road Cleaning

slowbird

slowbird

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I've recently moved up to Shelburne....and there are a few nice roads up here. ;)

Having said that ATV's, trucks, dumb drivers, plus other situations result in gravel, dirt and debris getting spilled and strewn over the roads.

I have been toying with the idea that since River Road and a couple other places are nearby, if I notice there's an ubsurd amount of debris I'd swing by with the car and a large push-broom and sweep it off the roads.
I'd probably wear a Hi-Vis vest, and be extremely careful about not blocking or obstructing traffic at any point. I'd just park the car on the shoulder, sweep/move/drag the debris away, hop back in the car, and drive off. (being careful not to drag more debris back on the road :p )

I'm curious about a few things.:

Am I allowed to do this?

Am I allowed to drop a Pylon here or there to help incoming vehicles notice there is something up ahead?

Could I suddenly be liable for anything?

Will residents living on the road be ****** that I'm making the road better for motorcycles? :p
(I don't really care if they do but can they tell me to get lost?)

...and as always I'm open to any ideas or input.
 
slowbird said:
I've recently moved up to Shelburne....and there are a few nice roads up here. ;)

Having said that ATV's, trucks, dumb drivers, plus other situations result in gravel, dirt and debris getting spilled and strewn over the roads.

I have been toying with the idea that since River Road and a couple other places are nearby, if I notice there's an ubsurd amount of debris I'd swing by with the car and a large push-broom and sweep it off the roads.
I'd probably wear a Hi-Vis vest, and be extremely careful about not blocking or obstructing traffic at any point. I'd just park the car on the shoulder, sweep/move/drag the debris away, hop back in the car, and drive off. (being careful not to drag more debris back on the road :p )

I'm curious about a few things.:

Am I allowed to do this?

Am I allowed to drop a Pylon here or there to help incoming vehicles notice there is something up ahead?

Could I suddenly be liable for anything?

Will residents living on the road be ****** that I'm making the road better for motorcycles? :p
(I don't really care if they do but can they tell me to get lost?)

...and as always I'm open to any ideas or input.
Click to expand...

Get ahold of the municipal Public Works department and talk to the Super. I don't know the area but they may have a sweeper in the Works Dept. and may have someone go out and do the road if you brought it up, if not they should be able to answer all your questions I would think.
 
Don't really see a problem with this. But I'm still surprised sometimes by some of the tchit people will whine about. Just keep in mind that road grit doesn't sweep away nice and easy like your kitchen floor. It's dense, thick, and dusty, so it could take a while and may still leave a thin layer of dirt that will compromise traction.
 
slowbird said:
I've recently moved up to Shelburne....and there are a few nice roads up here. ;)

Having said that ATV's, trucks, dumb drivers, plus other situations result in gravel, dirt and debris getting spilled and strewn over the roads.

I have been toying with the idea that since River Road and a couple other places are nearby, if I notice there's an ubsurd amount of debris I'd swing by with the car and a large push-broom and sweep it off the roads.
I'd probably wear a Hi-Vis vest, and be extremely careful about not blocking or obstructing traffic at any point. I'd just park the car on the shoulder, sweep/move/drag the debris away, hop back in the car, and drive off. (being careful not to drag more debris back on the road :p )

I'm curious about a few things.:

Am I allowed to do this?

Am I allowed to drop a Pylon here or there to help incoming vehicles notice there is something up ahead?

Could I suddenly be liable for anything?

Will residents living on the road be ****** that I'm making the road better for motorcycles? :p
(I don't really care if they do but can they tell me to get lost?)

...and as always I'm open to any ideas or input.
Click to expand...


I'm a municipal employee but I don't work outdoors. I wouldn't try anything like you suggested before getting written permission, signed, stamped and all that, from someone in your local municipality.
 
fastar1 said:
Just keep in mind that road grit doesn't sweep away nice and easy like your kitchen floor. It's dense, thick, and dusty, so it could take a while and may still leave a thin layer of dirt that will compromise traction.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. Thanks for the heads up.

To be honest, the roads I'm thinking about, the problem is usually Gravel from the shoulders. Cars dipping onto the shoulder, or vehicles pulling out of driveways tend to drag it onto the roads.

...that and the occasional tree-branch.


matthew said:
I'm a municipal employee but I don't work outdoors. I wouldn't try anything like you suggested before getting written permission, signed, stamped and all that, from someone in your local municipality.
Click to expand...

Wow!! That serious huh??

I didn't think sweeping the road would be a big deal.
 
I deal with contractors who do work in the municipal ROW. We require all sorts of permits, authorization, insurance and lots of red tape for them to do anything in the ROW. I know that sweeping up is different than the stuff I deal with, but I believe it's the same concept. It's best to inquire first before performing anything that will resemble what a road crew does.
 
Okie doke.

I think it's the Dufferin county so I'll have to figure out whom to call.

In my job I have called out for Municipal and City services to come out and clear, debris, salt/sand and other services...some of them very life threatening and they have always taken their sweet time.

That was in the Region of Peel though...maybe Dufferin will be better...but still. Was hoping a quick sweep would solve the problem and stop having to drag out a road crew.
 
tape the broom to your bike, so that the brush part cleans in front of your tires, problem solved.
 
slowbird said:
Will residents living on the road be ****** that I'm making the road better for motorcycles? :p
Click to expand...
I strapped my big push broom to my back and went out one day and swept a few corners on "secret road", there's a gravel road that joins the main road, right in the middle of a blind corner, lots of gravel there after winter. A resident came out and gave me a hand with his pressure washer, we were gettin it super clean. Eventually he asked me which house I lived in "Oh I don't live here, I'm just cleaning it so my motorcycle friends don't die on it"... didn't go so well after that, I had to leave when I saw him walking up his driveway with a baseball bat
throttle.gif


-Jamie M.
 
toysareforboys said:
I strapped my big push broom to my back and went out one day and swept a few corners on "secret road", there's a gravel road that joins the main road, right in the middle of a blind corner, lots of gravel there after winter. A resident came out and gave me a hand with his pressure washer, we were gettin it super clean. Eventually he asked me which house I lived in "Oh I don't live here, I'm just cleaning it so my motorcycle friends don't die on it"... didn't go so well after that, I had to leave when I saw him walking up his driveway with a baseball bat
throttle.gif


-Jamie M.
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wtf?
 
Stop being such a polite Canadian. If you want to do it out of the goodness of your own heart then just do it. The less government/law involvement, the better.
 
If you are a contractor, you must abide by MTO, Dept Of Labour, MOE, Township, City, etc etc etc! .... if you are a citizen,,, and are NOT causing a hazard,, the green book doesn't apply,, then you're golden. If an officer does drop by, you explain your good deed.... and he can choose to ask you to stop... call in the appropriate crews,, or let you continue on...easier to ask for forgiveness , than ask permission , imo, I do 2 corners in my 'hood.. and I use a pylon at each side.. and I wear blaze .... with a very stiff broom,, shovel, and try to do it just before a rain
 
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matthew said:
I deal with contractors who do work in the municipal ROW. We require all sorts of permits, authorization, insurance and lots of red tape for them to do anything in the ROW. I know that sweeping up is different than the stuff I deal with, but I believe it's the same concept. It's best to inquire first before performing anything that will resemble what a road crew does.
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The city has standards for the work they need done, and they need to ensure their contractors meet those standards. The city is accountable for the work done, at the end of the day. Not so with a private individual. I'd bet the city would prefer NOT to know what someone was doing on their own so they could be protected by deniability if anything went wrong.
 
slowbird said:
I have been toying with the idea that since River Road and a couple other places are nearby, if I notice there's an ubsurd amount of debris I'd swing by with the car and a large push-broom and sweep it off the roads.
I'd probably wear a Hi-Vis vest, and be extremely careful about not blocking or obstructing traffic at any point. I'd just park the car on the shoulder, sweep/move/drag the debris away, hop back in the car, and drive off. (being careful not to drag more debris back on the road :p )
Click to expand...


okay so what happens by the time you get back there on your bike?...You are expecting clean road/corner and in the time between you did this work and came back on your bike some dumbass comes by, hits the shoulder and shoots gravel all over the place....don't get me wrong, I think its a cool idea, but be careful
 
Doing it once may be ok, doing it repeatedly is a dangerous game. Many lakes in ontario used to have the hazards marked by cottagers, lawyers have been advising the cottagers to stop marking hazards as they could be found liable if someone gets hurt.

Sadly in todays society, your safest bet is to harass the municipality until they clean things up (personally I would probably do the hi-vis vest, broom thing without asking for permission and would never claim credit for doing it)
 
It is legal to park your vehicle in a place where it is legally allowed to park. It is legal to carry a broom.

Don't drop orange cones or anything official-looking ... just make sure your vehicle is not parked in a blind spot and that YOU are not sitting in a blind spot. If you insist on putting down any sort of warning triangle, use the kind that comes in your vehicle's emergency kit - not anything official-looking.

If a car comes while you are sweeping, just get out of the way.

Be in and out quick - take care of the issue in a minute or two and get out of there. I wouldn't bother trying to go through official channels unless the mess is so big that there is no way you could do it yourself in a few minutes.

It's a whole different ball game when the city is dealing with contractors, employees, etc.

For something like this, it's better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Not that I think anyone would complain about it unless you were spending considerable time at it.
 
One other thing; at this time of year a lot of roads have stripes of sand between the car wheel tracks. Whenever I'm in my car on the rural roads, I drive on the sand, to move it around. If no one drives on it, and the road is never swept by a street sweeper (rural roads often aren't), it will never go away.
 
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