Although there is a chance for additional snowfall next week, we seem to be over with the big snowstorms in Bowie - for now. I hear a lot of people talk about the blizzards that hit Bowie this season, but I think technically the last storm was the only snowstorm that can be considered a blizzard. Schools have been closed all week, and the Federal government was closed for an unprecedented four days.
The blowing and drifting snow made it tough to take an accurate measurement of the snow from the blizzard . This measurement of 8 inches seemed to be the average.
Our street was continuously plowed throughout the last storm, and we woke up Thursday morning with a clear street.
Many residential streets in Bowie were down to bare pavement after a day in the sun. Pictured here is Woodhaven Lane.
Some residential streets in Bowie could be better. This is a picture from Kitmore Lane.
Some sections of Belair Drive could use a little more work. Birds are using this slushy puddle as a birdbath. The section between Annapolis Road and Kenhill Drive was in rough shape.
Kenhill Drive is in great shape.
Visibility at some intersections is blocked by snowbanks. Here is the view looking right on Old Chapel Road from Woodhaven Lane.
The condition of County roads in Bowie was much better from their pre-blizzard state. Old Chapel Road was down to bare pavement in most spots, with an occasional spot of snow.
State roads in Bowie seem to be down to bare pavement as well, but you still have to be careful of the disappearing lane syndrome. You can see in this photo on Route 450 East that the right lane suddenly disappears in front of the library.
I took this "baseline" shot of the picnic table in our backyard around 5:00pm Friday evening, February 5th - before the last two storms.
And here is the picture of our picnic table after the most recent storm. A total of 33.5 inches of snow fell in the six days between the the time that I took the first and last photos.
Audrey Scott I recently wrote about former Bowie Mayor Audrey Scott vying to be the chairwoman of the Maryland Republican Party. She posted the following campaign video last week to tout her credentials for the job. This is definitely an interesting use of the Internet for an old school politician like Audrey. I love the intro music and the description of her house full of elephant trinkets as a "Republican safe haven." No donkeys in that house!
Northview Fire Station The Northview Fire Station recently opened in Bowie on the corner of Northview Drive and Health Center Drive. According to a Gazette article, this station will be staffed better than most area fire stations.
I snapped the following picture a couple of weeks before the station was operational. An electrician was working on the lights for the station's stained glass tile and mirror mosaic depicting a very happy and diverse workforce.
The mosaic was designed by local artist Cheryl Foster. Right on, Cheryl! Cheryl assembled the mural with help from several volunteers, including a group of elderly assistants from the nearby Bowie Senior Center.
This photo doesn't do the piece justice. The blue circles in the background contain symbols associated with Bowie and Prince George's County. I'll have to go back to the station for a close-up.
The girl featured in the mosaic is a young Rockledge Elementary School student and artist who inspires Cheryl Foster.
You can read more about the Northview Fire Station stained glass tile and mirror mosaic in a recent article published in The Sentinel.
Seven New Police Officers for Bowie It's a good thing that the new Bowie City Hall project has been kicked off. The Gazette recently reported that seven new police officers were sworn in during a recent City Council meeting. It would be a crime to force these new officers to work out of double-wides indefinitely. Plus the new digs for the city may give us the opportunity to have our very own call center to improve Bowie Police response times. Good times. Good times.
BGE Customers to Participate in Obama's Smart Grid Plan Baltimore Gas & Electric will be getting $200 million in federal stimulus money to install new "smart meters" in two million customer homes as a stepping stone to having a more advanced electrical grid. BGE will be kicking in $251 million of its own money for the project.
Each new smart meter will contain a component that is mounted on the inside of a house, and a light signal will help alert customers to upcoming peak energy usage times. BGE will implement a new energy pricing model, and customers will be able to save money by reducing their energy usage during the peak usage periods.
The program is not expected to be completed until 2014.
Aggressive Tree Trimming Continues Aggressive tree trimming continues along Maryland Route 197 in Bowie. I'm sure that there will be more unhappy residents.
Bowie City Elections Next Tuesday Don't forget to vote. Click here for election day information from the City of Bowie web site. I pretty much want the existing team to stay in place.
Lock Up Fundraiser for Muscular Dystrophy The Bowie Baysox are hosting an event to raise money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. Donations will benefit Bowie and Crofton families. The event is described as follows on the Bowie Baysox web site.
Community and business leaders agree to be locked up "for good" and are asked to raise bail by reaching out to family, friends, colleagues, and vendors are asking for help raising funds for MDA. The Lock-Up will celebrate the Jailbirds’ success in raising money to help send local children to MDA Summer Camp at Camp Maria in Leonardtown, MD. They will receive actual mug shots and a scrumptious lunch donated by Carrabba’s Italian Grill.
Baltimore Gas & Electric ranked 15th in a J.D. Power & Associates customer satisfaction survey of the 17 largest utilities in the East. I'm sure this doesn't come as a surprise to Bowie residents. I previously posted here about BGE's efforts to improve reliability in Bowie, and I guess it's appropriate to cut them a little slack until they complete that project. The situation seems to be better now than it was in the past, so BGE may be paying for past sins in the survey.
Of all the places that I've lived, I've never seen power outages with the frequency and duration as the power disruptions in Bowie. I think it was the summer of 2005 when we lost power for four days from a thunderstorm, and a couple of weeks later, we lost power for another three days when we received the remnants of what had been a hurricane and a tropical storm before it arrived in Bowie as rain and high winds.
BGE has said in the past that conditions are unique in the Levitt sections of Bowie, but the outages that I recall affected Anne Arundel County residents as well. Some people have speculated in the past that BGE gives more attention to the Baltimore area than customers to the South.
To BGE's credit, whenever we do have widespread outages, crews are brought in from other companies around the East to assist.
Even if/when the reliability issue is resolved, there is still the issue over billing. Some customer's bills have mysteriously doubled from one year to the next. BGE seems to have two general responses:
You must have doubled your electricity usage.
We installed a new meter on your house. Those old meters just weren't working right, and you've been undercharged all these years.
And what recourse do you have if a utility claims that your usage was higher than you think it was? Last summer we received a $600+ bill from Washington Gas for one month's worth of natural gas for our hot water heater. The bill is generally between $20 and $30. Luckily they adjusted the bill, and the description on the bill suggested a new or faulty meter. But if they hadn't adjusted the bill, I'm not sure what I could have done.
Check out this blog post and a related update to see how you can save on your electric bill in Maryland.
Scenes like the following are fairly common in the Levitt sections of Bowie this summer as Baltimore, Gas & Electric makes progress on the Bowie Electric Reliability Action Plan (BERAP). I spotted 10 or more trucks on a recent morning drive through the Somerset section.
The current project was preceded by a tree trimming pilot program in the Meadowbrook and Chapel Forge neighborhoods. The intent of the pilot program was to determine how tree trimming alone could address the frequent power outages that Bowie residents experience.
The BERAP extends tree trimming efforts to additional Bowie neighborhoods, and the program also includes upgrades to transformers, cables and poles. Some poles are being replaced, and the location of some poles are being changed.
The Leavitt sections of Bowie create a challenge for BGE because the utility poles are located in residents' yards - often in close proximity to houses. Although BGE has criteria for which trees, branches and shrubs must go, the residents' criteria is often different. Some residents are also finding new poles and support cables in their yards where there weren't any before.
At a high level, the goals of BGE and the residents of Bowie are the same: greater reliability and reduced outages. When it comes to lower level decisions, I've heard complaints about a favorite tree that was cut down or about a new support cable ruining the appearance of a yard. Unfortunately, those are the sort of trade-offs that are going to have to be made.
I took this "baseline" shot of the picnic table in our backyard around 5:00pm Friday evening, February 5th - before the last two storms.
