If you are keeping score, the City of Barrie has received 300 centimetres of snow since Nov. 1, 2025, or more than nine feet, according to city officials. In an average winter season, Barrie might get 280 centimetres on the high end, according to Dave Friary, the city's director of operations.
Barrie's Significant Weather Event, issued by the city on Dec. 28, remains in effect and is the longest on record.
Not only are work crews battling copious amounts of snow, but the bitter cold presents its own challenges when it comes to clearing the roads, and then there is also the province-wide shortage of road salt.
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"We're getting deliveries almost daily," Friary told Barrie 360 when asked about the road salt shortage. "We're in a monitor, ration, and conserve type of thing. We do have salt. We're just choosing to use it at the right time."
He said Barrie is part of a Georgian Bay Co-op purchasing program, and a lot of the city's neighbours are also in the purchasing group.
"We do a multi-year contract with a company out of Goderich. That means we have stable prices, and they usually serve us first, prior to contractors getting salt. We get priority and a constant price," Friary added.
As winter maintenance operations continue, when temperatures drop to -10 C, the city says salt does not work, whether put down by city vehicles or the salt people might use on their walkway.
"In very cold temperatures, sand is a better option to provide traction," the city said in a news release on Wednesday.
Snow lifts continue overnight to remove accumulation on arterial and collector roads in Barrie, with a focus on narrow curb lanes and on-street cycling lanes. In residential areas, contracted crews are removing snow piles from cul-de-sacs. Crews also continue to address sight line concerns in areas where snow banks are very high. The Significant Weather Event cannot be lifted until all narrowed roads and cycling lanes have been addressed.
Barrie's snow-removal budget in 2025 was $9.1 million, according to Friary, and he believes they are $3 million in the red, noting that also takes into account the heavy snowfall the city received in the first three months of that year.
