Rutted roads remain more than a week after snowstorm

More than a week after a snowstorm dumped 7 inches of snow on the Denver metro area, ice ruts remain on residential streets, causing problems for vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists. 

CBS News Colorado met John Gordon shoveling the street, near 32nd and Stuart. Right down to the asphalt.

CBS News Colorado's Rick Sallinger asked, "Shouldn't the city be doing this?" 

Gordon answered, "They were the ones that plowed it in there. They plow the streets and it all came up to my curb."

Getting your street cleared can seem like spinning your wheels. 

Deven Bender would agree, "It's actually horrible. We live in the alley behind here and we have a 1-foot groove of ice and we can't get our car out."

The City of Denver told CBS News Colorado to blame the weatherman. Only 1-5 inches was predicted last week and so they didn't deploy all the residential plows which won't bring the streets to the bare pavement and do not have deicer anyway.

One man felt the city could do better. Why? "Because it's been on the roads for too long you know the ice and stuff it's been on the road too long. You don't want to wait till spring? Don't have any choice."

Remember 2007 when school buses got stranded on the ice? Denver brought out the heavy equipment to clear the streets so far no plans for that this time around.

Deven may have to wait until spring  "I guess maybe summer whichever comes first."

CBS News Colorado received a statement from a city spokesperson Friday night saying: 

"People can report safety issues on the residential streets to us. We encourage them to be as specific as possible on the location, including nearest cross streets. We will either address it with a spot treatment, sending out a big plow out to put some dry deicer down to provide some traction, or work on removing the ice using a bigger piece of equipment called a blade. Requests for sanding can be handled pretty quickly, given the size of plow fleet.  Ice removal is a much slower process, as we have a handful of blades to cover the entire city.

Last Wednesday, we were looking at a forecast of 1-5 inches (coming in starting as rain) and a warm-up in temperatures to follow and we did not initiate a full deployment of the residential plows for that forecast. We got more than was forecasted.

We sent a few a small plows out on Thursday and Friday to address trouble spots.  However, the wet heavy snow we received got packed down pretty quickly, and for that, the residential plows, which are 4x4 pickup trucks, are not very helpful.  They will not bring streets to bare pavement, and do not carry deicer.

This was a particularly challenging storm event in that it was a wet, heavy, spring-like snow that fell at a very fast rate overnight during our coldest time of year.  The ice created by this snow event is going to linger for a bit. Shady spots and the south sides of east/west streets are particularly vulnerable.  Cleanup efforts will continue.

While not clear of snow, the residential streets are passable; if someone is having trouble getting from a residential street to a main street or experiencing a slick spot at an intersection, we encourage them to call us so we can address."

The City of Denver suggests you call 311 if you have a bad problem with ice and snow or use pocketgov.com.