Twin Cities Drivers Still Digging Out Of Historic Snowstorm

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – Valeria Langenfeld was greeted by a welcomed sight on her Northeast Minneapolis street. It wasn't the wet, heavy snow piled around her car, but the two men who started helping her dig out of the now infamous April Blizzard of 2018.

"My tires are frozen into the ice underneath all the snow. So I can push all the snow away but then getting it up and over the ice is tricky," she said, moments after her helpers threw down concrete mix below her tires for better traction.

As frustrating as shoveling and moving your vehicle amidst a snow emergency can be, it's much cheaper than allowing it to end up at the impound lot.

"On the plus side I didn't have to shovel," joked Jamie Lynn. She said her shovel broke over the weekend, then her roommate didn't come home with a new shovel, then her neighbor who was supposed to loan her a shovel never showed up.

"I was actually gonna come and sit in my car because I knew it was gonna get towed and I was just a second too late," she said.

She was one of hundreds of people whose vehicles were towed from city streets where plows were desperately needed. Other vehicles were scattered around the city with tickets on their hoods, lucky in the fact that they weren't towed.

"Oh yeah, I deserved it. It's a Monday. Happy Monday," she said before driving off.

She might truly be happy if she lived in St. Paul. Despite a snow emergency drivers weren't towed.

The city's contract with parking lots that take towed vehicles expired Friday, hours before the first flakes fell.

It's probably why Lyft driver Wells Her has driven most of his customers to the Minneapolis impound. He said he's brought at least five people there, many who were towed because of the snow emergency.

"I feel bad for them. I feel like this weather destroyed a lot of things," he said.

The line at the front counter at the impound lot seemed to never end, much like the winter weather outside.

"I just want it over," said Langenfeld. "I just want it to stop."

A city spokesperson said as of 6 p.m. Monday, 570 vehicles had been towed in Minneapolis since the start of the snow emergency.