His Fall-Winter forecast is usually very accurate, it has been for the last couple years.

2004 was quite a winter, very fun but somewhat harmful with the major ice storm.

I will hope for snow until Dec.!

I think folks in the midwest probably don’t “chain up” because they have (and actually need) studs most of the time. At least that is what I’m told by people who have lived there-and the road damage isn’t as bad there from studs because they aren’t beating on bare pavement most of the time.

I am willing to bet the vast majority of the snow tires put on every winter in Portland are not necessary. It has been my experience that an awful lot of people in Portland believe Studs + SUV = exactly the same driving behavior as a summer day. Those people are the reason I don’t like to drive if the weather here is bad. I am completely capable, and I’m not scared to do it if it’s just me and the road and that’s all-it’s the jerk in the gigantic SUV who put studs on and thinks that is the only change he needs to make in order to drive in bad weather that is the problem. I have almost been in accidents with that guy more times than I can count.

And I am not sure if you have noticed, but the city is not flat either. If you need chains “in the mountains” because of snow – then you need them when there is signifacant snow in the city…

The city (metro area) of Portland has “mountains” that are larger than some states largest mountain…

Michigan’s highest point is 1979 feet, their lowest is 571 feet – making the largest possible elevation change in Michigan only 1408 feet.

Wisconsin? 1951 feet highest, 579 feet lowest, 1372 foot difference.

Minnesota? 2301 feet highest, 601 feet lowest, 1700 foot difference.

By comparison, Portland has the West Hills which used to be called the Tualatin Mountains. There are elevation changes in the West Hills of more than 1000 feet. Tryon Creek area in SW Portland has a 900 foot vertical elivation change from Mt. Sylvania to the creek. Lake Oswego and West Linn have large “mountains” as well as Mt. Tabor, Rocky Butte, Powell Butte, and others in East Portland. Oregon City has a large elevation change between the river and the bluff, and then there are the likes of Bull mountain and the other mountains in the extreme SW metro area… I am sure that I have missed some…

By comparison – the largest vertical elevation change in Minnesota is 988 feet, and that is at a SKI AREA.

We have that kind elevation changes in Portland on highway 26 – a FREEWAY.

So even though the midwest might get more snow on a more regular basis – I would say that when we DO get snow in Portland, chains are probably a good thing. Even in the relatively flat area in East Portland there are big hills, around Brooklyn, Woodstock, Alameda, Overlook, etc etc…

I also say that most people in Portland should stay home when that happens. So that I can get to the slopes without getting run into by some moron with no winter driving skills. :)

But I can’t believe that you’re seriously suggesting that the 1-2 inches that Portland gets …..maybe….. for one or two days is “way nastier” than the min. 8 inches on the ground and a few new inches every day snow that lands in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, South Dakota, Nebraska and other “flyover” states?

Sure, some days it is “powder sugar” snow as you called it, but some days it’s nasty, nasty icy stuff – when it snows nearly every day you get as wide of a variety as we do rain.

In the 8 winters that I have lived in Portland the only snowfall that could remotely compare to anything that happens on a regular basis in any of those states was the one PAgent started off talking about in Jan ‘04 – and that only lasted for 2 days. Nothing else even merits mention.

So even if I bought some silly TV weatherman’s description of “why Portland snow is so dangerous” it still doesn’t occur often enough to validate hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to the roads, not to mention the danger that damage puts drivers in, because people drive around the city with tire chains on unneccessarily.

Anyhow, I haven’t trusted a weatherman in Portland since Jack Capell retired.

We’ve done both: Kansas/Oklahoma and Washington/Oregon. The latter is wetter and way nastier, as a result of the more moderate climate that keeps snow at always slushy 30 degrees, on average (as opposed to 5 to 20 degrees cooler in the flyover states, where the white stuff is more likely to arrive like a powdered sugar on a bundt cake. BIG difference.

Matt Zaffino explains this every winter. No one’s listening, eh?

I support climate predictions 100%. Bring it on!