It’s a Wonderful [City] Life in Winter !

Today’s the first official day of winter, and this weekend we got quite a sampling of what’s to come.  A significant snowfall always makes me aware again of the access and community advantages we enjoy living in the heart of our small city, compared with life in the surrounding suburbs and rural areas.

My wife and I look forward to walking about town to do our errands when the snow is flying and accumulating, because this is when cars  and trucks are less dominant on the streets, and we’re just as close to all our needs as we always are. While thousands of others who can’t manage daily errands and reach destinations, are dealing with driveway snow-plowing and navigating treacherous roadways just a few miles away from us, we are free to walk the sidewalks and streets with less car and truck traffic than usual. This makes the city something of a “winter wonderland” where neighbors can get to stores, banks, restaurants, and cultural events without moving their cars or thinking about a place to park. The reduced vehicle traffic even allows us to walk right in the streets if we choose, and the reduced and snow-muffled traffic noise is also a blessing.

At our workplaces on heavy-snow mornings, we always find that we and our fellow city-dwellers are able to be there while the suburbanites are either kept home for the day or at least a few hours late getting in. I happen to be a business owner whose staff members all live within walking distance. Year-round this minimizes our parking needs, but on snowy days we barely feel the bump.

Sure, it’s a little more challenging walking around in the deep snow, and there’s plenty of shoveling to do, but compared with trying to maintain, move, and park multiple cars, we find city living and working a pleasure. If we’re not up to shoveling, we can readily find folks walking the neighborhoods shouldering shovels who are willing to clear our walks for a few dollars, and sometimes for free. We bundle up, pull on our best walking boots, and enjoy the winter air, feeling like we’re getting some good physical exercise and accomplishing our daily tasks.  City groceries, like our new one at 213 West King Street (!), are open daily and long hours, since many of their workers walk to work too. So this makes food shopping and cooking a pleasurable ritual on winter weekends or evenings.  

All in all, we are close to what we need, we feel secure within easy reach of the city’s full-time fire and police departments, just a few steps from helpful neighbors, and if necessary, we could even walk to either of two hospitals, our pharmacy, and our dentist within a few minutes.

City life is certainly not yet all we think it should be, and continual improvement is always necessary.  But life in an intact and living city center can promise freedom from cars, parking lots, supermarkets, highways, and daily commutes.  We feel fortunate to be living and working in the historic heart of Lancaster.