Power Restored, Parking Ban Continues in Hamilton

The driving ban helped avoid any major problems in Hamilton and Wenham during the blizzard on Friday and Saturday.

"Everyone, for the most part, listened to the governor's warning," said Hamilton Police Lt. Scott Janes.

Gov. Deval Patrick issued a driving ban by executive order at 4 p.m. on Friday. It ran until 4 p.m. on Saturday.

For a time, Chebacco Road was blocked when a tree came down and brought power lines with it.

"There were times when some of the roads were snowed in," Janes said on Saturday afternoon. "Right now all the secondary roads are passable but most will needed to be widened."

The Department of Public Works was called when needed and addressed problem spots, Janes said.

There were no car crashes reported in Hamilton. In Wenham, a car went off the road into a tree near the start of the storm on Friday. Nobody was injured.

The on-street parking ban remain in effect in Hamilton.

Had things gotten worse, Hamilton police were ready were 4-wheel drive vehicles, Janes said. The light, dry snow likely helped avoid widespread power outages and other more serious problems, he said.

About two feet of snow fell in Hamilton and Wenham, although no officials measurements are available for the two towns. in Topsfield, 24 inches was the official measurement and it was 25 inches in Salem. At 7 a.m., before the storm ended, 18.5 inches was logged as an official measurement in Beverly.

At the peak, about 45 homes were without electricity in the two towns, according to National Grid. Most of those homes were along Chebacco Road, and power was restored there by Saturday evening. A small number of residents near Bay Road and Longmeadow Way in Hamilton were without power as were a small number of homes along Main Street in Wenham on Saturday evening.

There was a fire alarm at Gordon College around midnight on Saturday morning and driving there showed Wenham firefighters the full force of the storm.

"It was a full blown blizzard at that time," Chief Bob Blanchard said.

In one case, firefighters assisted one resident who was concerned that a fire hydrant had been buried by snow. Blanchard encouraged residents to clear the hydrants near their homes and said the Water Department will start to clear hydrants once road plowing is complete.

At about midnight on Saturday morning Walnut Road was also blocked by a downed tree, but it did not cut power and was cleared before affecting traffic - it hapenned in the middle of the night at the height of the storm during the driving ban.

The storm provided few problems, "all things considered," Blanchard said.

"We've had lesser storms that we have been going crazy with," Blanchard said.