Malden mayor lifts parking restrictions, is winter over?

MALDEN - If you follow Malden's Mayor Gary Christenson on Twitter, you may have seen his tweet Wednesday lifting parking restrictions and effectively saying, winter is done. But is that true? can we turn the page on winter right into spring?

Althea Harvey, a longtime resident of Malden, said "we never know what's going to happen between now and St. Patrick's Day, even into April. So no, I don't believe it's over.

David Callinan added, "Is winter done... I don't know if it's even begun, truthfully. It still feels like spring. It's February out here. I keep asking myself, they keep saying winter is coming, but I haven't seen it."

Another Malden resident, Annie Lieng, said she was looking forward to spring because it hasn't been too cold for too long lately.
Stephen Hayes has lived in Malden for 7 ½ years and there hasn't been a winter like it since he moved there. "I'm ready for spring," he said. "I'm ready for St. Patrick's Day. I'm ready for March Madness. I'm ready for the Red Sox.... we're done with winter. It's over." 

Does the data support the mayor's lifting the winter parking bans?

Boston is coming off the fifth warmest January on-record, and is in the middle of the eight warmest winter to-date. Sure, we've had some extreme cold, setting records for the coldest day since the 1950s. But that was fleeting, and the trend looking ahead is weak, if you're a winter lover.

Boston's average snowiest month is February, and we only have a *trace* of snow. For the season, we sit with a measly 7.9".

There will likely be some record warm temperatures set Friday and the longer-range forecasts look very mild.

That takes us right into March and April, which can feature some good snowstorms. One thing snow has to battle once you get into March is the increasing sun angle, which tends to melt the snow faster.

So, is it too early to declare winter as done? We shall see.

In:
• Malden News