Carmel Convo
Every year, people freak out about the first snow of the season.
TV meteorologists point at a green screen and scare the populace with warnings of a Snowmageddon. Residents recall the Blizzard of ’78 and rush to the local grocery store to clear the shelves of bread and milk.
Side note: Some of these people never eat bread or drink milk but stock up when there’s an inch of snow as if they were Doomsday-preppers and someone accidentally spilled Diet Coke on the nuclear-launch button.
A snowstorm gets people worried. But not me.
That’s because I live in Carmel.
Friends in Indianapolis: I don’t mean to brag but the road crews in Hamilton County are the best at clearing snow and repairing streets. How do I know? My parents live just south of 96th Street. When I go to visit them I have to be careful not to damage my car. There’s a foot of snow in the winter. Once it thaws, there are potholes so deep you could reach in and pull out Chinese food.
Carmel puts salt on the roads at the appropriate times and gets the roads cleared in a timely manner.
My family and I own an Italian restaurant on Main Street. There have been very few times we have closed due to snow in the eight years we’ve been opened. Because Carmel does such a great job clearing the streets, there are a surprising number of people who make the journey out and about. We can stay open more often, make more money and therefore pay more taxes.
Not only does Carmel clear the roads but they do a great job with sidewalks, paths and parking lots. A day after the most recent snow storm, the Monon Greenway was clearer than some streets in Indianapolis. That’s good news for us dog owners who still have to walk our dogs even if it’s snowy outside. I personally own a Shiba Inu, which is a Japanese breed that looks like a smaller husky. He has a thick coat of fur and loves colder temperatures so it’s nice to be able to walk him without slipping and breaking my neck.
Because road crews clear the streets properly, there’s less of a chance of ice melting into cracks, expanding once they freeze again, and creating potholes in the roads. When cracks do form, our Hamilton County communities address them quickly so serious damage isn’t done to the base of the roads.
Thank you for keeping us all safe!
Adam Aasen is a co-owner of Donatello’s Italian Restaurant and a former journalist who lives in Carmel. His column “Carmel Convo” will appear twice each month in The Reporter.