Chicagoans Dig Out In Bitter Cold
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Many homeowners spent the day in the freezing cold, as they dug out from the blizzard that dumped 20.2 inches of snow on the area.
As CBS 2's Susanna Song reports, along side streets in the Beverly neighborhood, one lane was often plowed, but was far from thoroughly clean.
Along the sides of the streets, lines of parked cars were trapped in 1 to 2 feet of snow.
So homeowners were out shoveling, and one scoop of heavily-packed snow required plenty of muscle power and a big exhale.
It was a long morning for Curtis Clay, who said he had dug out cars three times in Riverdale by 11 a.m. Thursday.
"My back hurt at the same time," he said.
Clay finished digging out neighbor Shellina Davis' car, but there were plenty more to dig out on just one block.
"Too much for me," Clay said. "This is the first time I've really seen it this deep in a while."
"I'm not able to shovel the snow, and I was praying this morning, I said, 'Lord, let someone come by to do my shoveling, I had to go out today, you know,' and I look out the door, and got a man, he was passing by," Davis said.
But for other neighbors, there are more serious problems. Riverdale resident Frank Robinson is waiting for crews to plow his alley.
"Turning to go either north or south is impossible. I would never make it down the alley," he said, "so somebody has to come back down and plow."
The alley is impassable without four-wheel drive. Robinson parked his car in his garage thinking it would be "a safe haven for the car," but now his car is stuck there.
Some drivers chose to test their vehicles' strength, even though it took a couple of tries to attempt to parallel park in the snow.
"You just have to deal with it. It's Chicago," one man said.
"That's all we can do," another man added. "Laugh now. You can't do anything about it."
Turns are proving to be the biggest challenge for drivers, with major snow accumulation at intersections.
Still, by Thursday afternoon, some residential streets were still mired in snow from curb to curb. CBS 2's Dorothy Tucker monitored one Austin street for hours until a plow finally arrived.
