Editorial: Don't create a hazard after recent snowfall

Snow means revisiting some winter etiquette we haven't seen for a couple years.

So these tips bear repeating.

• Please don't relocate your snow into and across any roadway. It's illegal, it's a traffic hazard and it makes your neighbors crazy. With temps all over the map, today's harmless slush pushed onto the road can become tonight's hazardous speed bump.

• Shovel a pathway to your propane tank. Your propane deliverer is schlepping a heavy hose through the snow as it is. Tripping, sliding or falling should not be an additional occupational hazard just to keep your house warm.

• Clear a path to your mailbox. Once the plows come through, it can really slow down mail delivery if the carrier has to get out of the vehicle to walk your mail to the box. Carriers' routes are bid on their ability to get through an entire route during the day. Getting out of the car every thirty seconds isn't required or recommended.

• City residents, shovel your sidewalks. Use salt or de-icer if necessary. Too many folks have fallen already this winter and gotten hurt. A snow-covered sidewalk hides the danger lurking underneath - sheer ice.

• It shouldn't be necessary to remind folks not to pile, blow or push snow into the neighbors' yard, or fire up the snow blower at o' dark thirty, annoying everyone within hearing distance.

• Keep boisterous pets indoors. Just one jump on an elderly neighbor walking across a slippery lawn can invite a lawsuit. An 80-pound dog rushing out to greet the UPS guy with a big box isn't a welcome sight.

For that matter, keep pets indoors for their own welfare. If it's too cold for humans to be out, it's inhuman to leave a dog out all day and night.

• Slow down, for Pete's sake. Streets are slippery, snow is piled high causing limited visibility and no one needs to be anywhere in such a hurry that it endangers everyone around them. Watch for snowmobilers in the ditches, kids sledding down hills, vehicles coming out of nowhere at intersections.