Three cheers to the UAF Facility Services for snow removal.  Hip, Hip, Hooray.  Hip, Hip, Hooray.  Hip…(silence)…yeah that's what I thought. 

As a student of this northern university, I take into consideration many factors and live with them.  Such factors are cold weather, frozen nose hairs, snow and ice on the sidewalks; these are things to be expected.  What is also to be expected is the sound of machinery for snow removal.  However, I did not pay thousands of dollars for a front row performance of all the VROOM's of the engines and BEEP-BEEP's of these vehicles reversing at 12:30 a.m. 

Yes people I did say 12:30 a.m.

I live in Wickersham Hall, facing the Wood Center.  Now here is some physics, sound travels through solid objects and amplifies by bouncing between objects, hence the sounds are made louder.  So, when any service vehicle goes near the Wood Center, I am privileged to hear them.

I have no problems with the university trying to clear the snow and ice from the high traffic areas (hears grinding of metal against cement…1:06 a.m.), in fact it is a necessary safety issue.  Clearing these areas when they have the least amount of traffic is ideal, which does occur at night, but how is 9:00 p.m. different from 1:00 in the blessed morning?!

Right now I am sitting at my computer typing this letter very tired from a long day of classes and work, unable to sleep because I'm hearing the scraping of these snow removal machines.  I have called Facility Services once, to voice my annoyance about this (at the time I was complaining about 5:45 a.m. work…silly me) and got the feeling that I should just live with it.  Ah yes my fellow UAF students, just live with it…after all we're just students.

In hearing the sounds of the snow removal crew move towards the library and elsewhere on campus (1:20 a.m.), I begin to think about how walking to class will be even more hazardous to my health than prior to their noisy scraping.  We now have compacted snow that is slicker than snot, all ready for those lucky early risers trying to get an education.  Now, if there was some logic here, following this scraping, gravel would be spread on these areas, but that won't happen until about mid-day. 

Where I was born and raised in Michigan, when snow begins to collect, we scrape or shovel it away as soon as we can.  If one doesn't remove the snow quickly, it will be compacted into ice and make life really miserable.  Now, one would think the same attitude would apply here.  But no, we wait for a few days AFTER the snowfall; wait 'till the snow has been compacted before scraping. 

What am I trying to say here? Well, through the sarcasm of this graduate student (1:25 a.m. and the beeps are still going) I hope my annoyance has been voiced.  Why can't the university take care of this stupid snow removal in a timely manner, so I can get some sleep? Is that too much to ask? I mean with tuition increases, increase in fees, etc., one would think that this would not be a problem.  So, I guess I just live with this annoyance and interruption into my precious sleep and hope and pray that I will not snap at someone at work or begin snoring in my classes due to lack of sleep.  Ah yes, I keep forgetting, what do I know, I'm just a student.  Funny, the university wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the students…(1:30 a.m....perhaps I can get some sleep).

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