Snow Melting Machines - Taking Care of Business at Parking Lot Mississauga Library Port Credit Ontario

Update December 31, 2009 - see photo bottom of page!
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Walking into Port Credit village in Mississauga (Ontario, Canada), it was hard to miss the large snow and ice mountain outside the library. Even harder to miss were the noisy, large, yellow snow melting machine and the front end loader that was busy feeding it large bites of snow and ice.

Snow Melting Machine and Truck

This photo shows the view from beside Hook's restaurant on Lakeshore Road, on the east side of the Credit River and Port Credit lighthouse.

Closer View : Snow Melting Machine Port Credit ON

The snow and ice are fed into the top of the unit, then melted, and the water runs down the sewer.

Close Up View - Snow Melter Machine

Making a mini lake in Mississauga: According to the company's web site (link at bottom for info), melting snow is more cost efficient than hauling it to a central dumping site, then waiting for Spring!.

Outside Mississauga Library at Port Credit

This photo shows the view from the library drive, looking roughly north from Lakeshore Road. A few years ago, I'd watched a smaller truck snow melter unit on a Toronto street. These more mobile machines drive slowly along the curb, the front of the unit sucking up snow banks, melting snow, then spitting out hot water.

Snow and Ice Pile beside library - Mississauga Canada

This is a picture of snow that's as far from a Winter Wonderland as possible! This dirty, gritty, frozen solid snow mountain looked set to stay. I took the photos above at around 2 p.m.

Night time snow Melter - Men Working, Still!

The snow melter and loader were still clearing snow and ice that night at 8 p.m. Though a little hard to see in this photo, the pile of snow has been reduced by roughly a third, maybe more. Just after I took the picture, the truck shifted the melter to the area that had now been cleared of ice. I have to wonder how late they kept working!

New Year's Eve Day - Still Working in Port Credit

I went into Port Credit at noon today, and the snow melter is still working! About 48 hours from when I first saw it. The snow and ice pile is nearly gone. The temp was about minus 10C (14 F) with gusty winds. The cold snap had more firmly frozen the snow mountain, and the loader was breaking chunks up with the shovel bucket. I took a short video of the snow melter in operation.

See my video of this machine in operation at YouTube
For information on how these types of ice and snow melters work, see this site.
For pictures of pretty snow, see this post from last January.
For more winter in Canada pictures and tips, see snow in Canada page.

What a difference a year makes!!

Lakeshore Road at Port Credit Library

 This picture, above, shows the same location December 31, 2009 at 2 p.m. Instead of a huge mountain of snow being melted, the parking lot is actually being used for parking. A light rain was falling, temp was about 4C (39 F). My kind of winter but I do sympathize with the snow removal contractors who are temporarily out of work.