[filmgirlcw]

I grew up in Atlanta Georgia, a place that is notoriously bad at dealing with snow [1], and never thought I would live in a place worse at snow than Atlanta. Then, after nearly a decade in New York City (a place that has snow on lock. In Brooklyn, it’ll snow 18 inches and the sidewalks and roadways will be clear by 5am. And the city is even better!), I moved to Seattle.

Seattle is worse at snow than Atlanta, something I didn’t think was possible. I avoided most of the 2019 snowpacalypse because I was in Australia (I smartly changed my flight and flew to LA early so I wasn’t stranded in the airport when the snow really hit like some of my colleagues…spending a day at Disneyland instead of worrying about making my connection to my 15-hour flight to Sydney was one of the smarter travel decisions I’ve ever made), but I was in Bellevue of all places before it really came down for a work-offsite, but it was icy and there were drifts, and it was shocking to me how poorly even the commercial areas dealt with ice and snow. I had to have my husband bring my snow boots from NYC to where I was staying 12 miles away (at The W) so that I wouldn’t break my neck walking across the street from the hotel to the venue of the off-site. I understand the lack of infrastructure, but it was again, worse than Atlanta. And Atlanta is a city that doesn’t have mountains/ski resorts nearby.

Last year, it snowed a bit and they were downright negligent about clearing out the snow and ice in front of my luxury apartment building/the busy sidewalk, making it nearly impossible to even leave (even by car, let alone if you were trying to walk). A lot of that was on the building owner, but the city was equally negligent with its lack of attempts to make streets accessible by foot or by car. A girl at UW died in 2019 because the school both didn’t put out proper signage for ice and didn’t do the rational thing and try to de-ice campus.

Like I said, I never thought I’d see a city handle snow worse than Atlanta. But the PNW (and Seattle especially) certainly does.

[1]: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/01/atlanta-snow...

[taeric]

To be fair, the advantage of being ready for the few days of snow in either place is pretty low. I remember all the cars stranded in the interstate in Atlanta. Had to walk to pick up my kids from the school about two miles away because the buses were stuck in traffic.

Here in Seattle, I was lucky that I was only a block from a grocery store. Roads may have been bad, but I wouldn't know. Just stuck closer to home.

Of course, now I live out down a non city maintained road. Guessing it will be longer before I get out, this time.

[waynecochran]

Be careful not to conflate those west of the Cascades (esp. Seattle and Portland) with those on the east side (e.g. Bend, Spokane). Those who who live(d) east of the mountains handle snow just fine.

[mynameisash]

> Those who who live(d) east of the Mountains handle snow just fine.

I spent most of my life in Minnesota, and even there, people think they can handle snow (which they do better than folks here in the Puget Sound region). But every year, there are huge pileups, gruesome accidents, slowdowns, etc. They, just as people east of the Cascades, have more experience, but I would stop short of saying that they 'handle it just fine.'

[waynecochran]

True. It only takes one bozo to mess everything up. I often see crazy folks passing as they are heading up to ski who think they are impervious to snow / ice on the roads. BTW, Minnesota was much farther east than I meant.

[thehappypm]

Just a nit but Atlanta does have mountains nearby. The Appalachians begin around Atlanta and there are 4000 foot mountains just 90 minutes away.