That changed after the turn of the century, when the city took charge. In the early 1900s, labourers were hired to shovel snow for 25 cents an hour. It was taken away in horse-drawn carts. The first snowblower to clear the streets was purchased by the City of Montreal nearly 100 years ago, in 1928.

The city of Montreal says it’s cleared about a third of the snow from the two historic back-to-back major winter storms that hit the city last Thursday and Sunday. This is the fifth day of Montreal’s snow-removal operation,

Snow removal will begin Wednesday morning and is expected to take up to three weeks with crews working around the clock, the city said.