Snow Removal in Pickering: Gold and Platinum Plow the Driveway Before the Commuter Run, Silver Clears the Windrow

Snow is sold inside a membership that covers lawn season and snow season together, billed in twelve equal payments on the last day of the month. Three tiers, and the difference between them in winter is not subtle. Gold at $189 a month plus HST and Platinum at $279 a month plus HST plow the driveway. Silver at $129 a month plus HST does not plow the driveway. Silver gets a separate daytime pass that clears the windrow across the foot of the drive by 5 PM, plus four banked full clears a season on request, and no salting. Every driveway claim on this page names the tier it belongs to, because that is the line most winter contracts leave blurry.

Pickering leaves early, and that decides what snow removal has to do

Pickering is a commuter town. The GO station, the 401, Brock Road heading north and Kingston Road heading west all empty out before seven in the morning. For a household here, snow is not a shovelling problem. It is a departure time problem. A driveway cleared at eleven o'clock is a driveway that has already cost you the train.

That is why the targets on this page are times rather than adjectives.

The order after the snow stops is fixed. Commercial and medical access properties first, overnight. Then Platinum members, sequenced first on the residential route, with a 6:30 AM target. Then Gold members, with a 7:00 AM target. Then Silver members on a separate daytime windrow pass by 5 PM.

Set that next to what the biggest operator serving Pickering already publishes: in a heavy storm it may be up to twenty four hours after the snow stops before it reaches a property, and in a multi day storm it clears once a day. That is honest of them and it is the number worth comparing. Ours is 6:30 AM on Platinum and 7:00 AM on Gold.

Both are targets, not guarantees. A truck can break down and a storm can do whatever it wants. We publish the trigger, the order and your place in it, and we do not write a snowfall guarantee because nobody can honour one.

The 3 cm trigger, and why it is written on the page

We go out at 3 cm. Automatic. No phone call required to start the run.

Most companies serving Pickering publish no trigger depth at all, and that silence is doing quiet work. An unpublished trigger is a decision made on the morning, by somebody looking at a full route and a borderline snowfall. Written down, three centimetres removes the judgement call. It is about the depth at which a car starts pushing snow rather than rolling over it, and it is well below the depth at which a driveway packs down into ice that stays for a fortnight.

The three memberships, and exactly what each one does in winter

Silver, $129 a month plus HST

Silver does not plow the driveway and carries no 7 AM target. What it buys in winter is a separate daytime pass by 5 PM that removes the windrow, the packed ridge the plow leaves across the bottom of the drive, plus four banked full driveway clears a season that you call on when you choose. No salting on Silver, ever. It is the right tier for a household that will shovel its own drive and wants the heavy end of the job done by a machine.

Gold, $189 a month plus HST

Gold plows the driveway and carries the 7:00 AM target after overnight snow. For a commuting household in Pickering this is the tier that matches the actual problem: open before the morning run, cleared by a machine instead of by you in the dark. Salt on Gold is available as a salt only trip at $25.

Platinum, $279 a month plus HST

Platinum is sequenced first, with a 6:30 AM target, unlimited automatic salting, and first choice of service day in lawn season. If you are catching an early train out of Pickering GO, this is the tier written for that. Unlimited automatic salting is the line to read twice: in this market salt is normally billed per application, or left to the homeowner and a bag in the garage. On Platinum it goes down when the conditions call for it, with no call and no separate charge.

The windrow at the end of your driveway

When the plow runs your street it leaves a ridge of compacted snow across every driveway on the block, and moving that ridge falls to the homeowner. It is the densest snow on the property, packed by a blade, and it usually turns up shortly after you have finished clearing everything else.

On Gold and Platinum it is taken out as part of the morning driveway clear. If the plow comes back later the same day and blocks you in again after we have been through, a windrow return trip is $45. On Silver the windrow pass is the service: a daytime run by 5 PM, timed to happen after the street has been plowed rather than before.

Snow removal in Amberlea, Rosebank, Liverpool, Bay Ridges, Dunbarton, Brock Ridge and Woodlands

Pickering is not one snow job, it is several, and the difference runs north to south.

Brock Ridge and the newer streets in the north of the city have the wide driveways, sometimes double, on land that is still open on one side. Wind crosses open ground, picks up snow and stacks it against the first thing that stops it, which is your drive. A wide drive after a drifting night is the better part of an hour with a shovel and a few minutes with a machine, and that gap is the whole argument for a plow.

Amberlea, Woodlands and Dunbarton are mature Pickering: full size driveways with trees that break some of the wind, long enough that hand clearing before a 6:40 departure is not a real plan.

Liverpool sits in the middle of everything and is where the traffic problem and the snow problem meet: side streets get plowed later than the arterials, so the windrow tends to land after people want to leave.

Rosebank and Bay Ridges take wind off the lake. Snow that fell politely overnight does not always stay where it fell, and a drive that looked clear at eleven at night can be drifted over by six.

We book by geography, one truck, one route. The tighter our members sit on a Pickering street, the earlier everybody on that stretch gets cleared, which is a real reason to mention us next door.

What it costs, and how you actually pay for it

The membership is billed in twelve equal payments on the last day of each month, by card on file. It covers lawn season and snow season together, so there is no separate snow contract to sign in November and no seasonal lump sum landing in December.

Silver is $129 a month plus HST. Gold is $189 a month plus HST. Platinum is $279 a month plus HST.

Paying the year up front saves 5 percent: $1,470.60 Silver, $2,154.60 Gold, $3,180.60 Platinum.

There are two extras and no others. A salt only trip is $25. A windrow return trip, for when the city reblocks you after we have already cleared, is $45.

Refer a neighbour and you both take 30 percent off one month, with a floor of $50 each, so neither side ends up with a token discount.

Season dates, and the day the Pickering snow route closes

Snow season runs mid November to mid April. The snow route closes 15 November and the date does not move.

One truck carries a fixed number of driveways and still makes a 6:30 AM and a 7:00 AM target. Once the route is full it is full, and saying so in October is worth more to you than taking your money in January and missing the morning.

Who you are actually calling

Andrew, the owner, runs the truck. One truck, one operator, fully insured and HST registered.

Office hours are Monday to Friday 7 AM to 7 PM and Saturday 7 AM to 5 PM. Closed Sunday. We reply the same day, Monday to Saturday, not seven days a week, because a promise that breaks every Sunday is worth less than no promise at all. During a snow event somebody watches messages through the overnight and the early run, which is a separate thing from office hours and is the part that counts at 4 AM.

Phone 905-244-5779. Email andrew@northlinepropertycare.ca. Green in summer. Clear in winter.

Questions Pickering homeowners ask

Will my driveway be clear before I leave for the train?

Gold and Platinum memberships plow the driveway. Platinum is sequenced first with a 6:30 AM target and Gold follows with a 7:00 AM target after overnight snow. Both are targets, not guarantees, and no snowfall guarantee is made. Silver does not plow the driveway and is cleared on a separate daytime windrow pass by 5 PM.

At what depth of snow do you come out in Pickering?

Northline clears at a 3 cm trigger. Once 3 cm has fallen the route runs automatically and you do not need to call. The order after a storm is commercial and medical access first overnight, then Platinum members by a 6:30 AM target, then Gold members by a 7:00 AM target, then Silver members on a separate daytime windrow pass by 5 PM.

Does the $129 Silver membership plow my driveway?

No. Silver does not plow the driveway and has no 7 AM target. Silver includes a separate daytime pass by 5 PM that clears the windrow at the end of the driveway, four banked full driveway clears a season on request, and no salting. Driveway plowing is on Gold at $189 a month plus HST and Platinum at $279 a month plus HST.

Is salting included in Pickering?

Unlimited automatic salting is included on Platinum at $279 a month plus HST, applied when conditions call for it and without being asked. On Gold, salt is available as a salt only trip at $25. There is no salting on Silver at any time.

How am I billed, and is snow a separate contract?

Snow and lawn are one membership billed in twelve equal payments on the last day of each month. There is no separate winter contract and no seasonal lump sum. Paying the year up front saves 5 percent: $1,470.60 Silver, $2,154.60 Gold, $3,180.60 Platinum. A windrow return trip is $45.

Book snow removal in Pickering before 15 November

Call 905-244-5779 or email andrew@northlinepropertycare.ca with your street and the time you need to be out of the driveway. We will tell you where you land on the route and whether the morning target is realistic for your address before you commit to anything.

Everything we do in Pickering

• Lawn care and snow removal in Pickering: the combined membership, month by month.
• All three memberships and what each one clears, with the arithmetic shown.
• What snow removal costs in Durham Region, seasonal, per visit and per month side by side.
• Commercial snow removal in Pickering and Durham Region, on a 5 cm trigger and a photographed site log.
• Our hours and service area, and what happens on a storm morning.
• Snow removal in Ajax, the next town over on the same route.
• Snow removal in Whitby, the next town over on the same route.
• Frequently asked questions about billing, triggers and cancellation.