Cindy MacDougall
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Dec 03/99) - It's 7 a.m. on a Saturday morning, and city employee Joe Vodnoski has been carefully spreading sand and gravel on Yellowknife's streets for two hours.

"This is nothing," Vodnoski says as he revs up his giant yellow gravel spreader truck. "We have guys who come in at one and three (in the morning) for snow removal."

Driving down Franklin Ave., Vodnoski carefully backs up, letting out a small amount of gravel from the truck's spreader. The truck holds about 11 metres worth of gravel, and Vodnoski will use about two or three loads to cover the streets in downtown and Old Town.

"We do it this early in the morning to avoid the traffic," he says. "People sometimes complain about the beep, beep (noise the truck makes). But most people are okay."

Vodnoski says snow removal, which is done a few times a year, can cause a ton of towing.

"We've pulled as many as 20 vehicles in a night," he said, the truck's yellow light flashing as he covers 54th Street with a layer of gravel.

"People would park right by the (snow removal area) signs. Then they call the city in the morning and say, 'Where's my truck?'"

On the most part, says Vodnoski, Yellowknifers are considerate about the snow crew, even when there's a bit of an accident.

"I've taken out a few windshields (with flying pieces of gravel)," he says. "And I accidentally broke the glass door of the Reddi-Mart last winter."

"They were really great about it. What can you do but apologize and fix it?"

It's the warm days that make his job tough, he says.

If it's -5 C or above, everything just turns into a big skating rink," Vodnoski says. "You put down the gravel, and it doesn't stick to the ice. It just blows away."

As cars and trucks begin to fill the streets, Vodnoski goes back for one last load.

He says he likes spreading gravel, but his favourite snow crew job is removing the snow.

"It's nice to look at the streets, at how clean they are, and the pile of snow and know I did a good job," he says.