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June 15, 1995 To: From: Re: Snowmobile Committee Mike Auspos Comments On Snowmobiles In Ramsey I have attached statistics on snowmobile complaints received by this department starting with the 1991 season (we used 9-1-91 as a start date for the seasons) through the end of the 1994-1995 season. I have not analyzed the data to determine the actual content of each complaint nor have I determined the number of repeat complaints (same complainant). I would stress that these are statistics only and without a thorough, and quite time consuming, process of examination of each event one can not draw 'too many conclusions from them. That is, there are many factors that can cause one year's complaints to differ from a previous year(s). Snow cover, temperature extremes, economy are three. A growth in population and concurrent increase in number of complaints about snowmobiles does not mean the two are connected, necessarily. It could mean that there were excellent snow conditons and people were making money that season. I would suspect however, that as our population increases, particularly with urban lots, we will see an increase in the complaints. For the past two seasons we have had the use of a police marked snowmobile for enforcement efforts and have been able to get out to a very limited degree due to manpower and weather conditions. Not only do warm days play havoc with patrolling with the machine but on snowy days, particulary when there is a heavy snowfall, our patrol has more priority duties on the highways in patrol cars. Unfortunately, this is also when the machines come out in force. We have advertised our enforcement efforts and the ordinance about to the limit of practicality. We have no way of knowing the effectiveness of this information effort but at least the public can not say it has not been informed. Judging from the amount of tracks in open field areas, quite a few operators have completely ignored the prohibitions against riding on private property without permission. This has been particularly true in the case of fields belonging to A1 Pearson, since much of his affected land lies along highway 10 and/or adjacent to housing areas. Many of the other open areas are fallow land or just land awaiting development and we get no complaints from the owners. I suspect that the largest number of complaints come from persons who call about operation either on the "boulevard" area adjacent to the streets or to lawns/property close to these boulevards. Noise is usually not a factor in complaints, unless it is a late night/early morning incident. Speeding up and down the streets is also somewhat common and is largely more a perception of speed than actually violating the posted speed limit or, in some cases, just an irritation to some citizens. One suggestion that I will present in this memo (I will probably have others at the meeting) is that the committee or at least a subcommittee join together and tour the city in areas where snowmobiles are problematic and actually examine