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<br />000022 <br /> <br />The Simulation Model <br /> <br />The simulation model estimates snow removal costs using information <br />about wages, machines and removal procedures gathered from road maintenance <br />foremen in each county and daily snow amounts recorded at National Weather <br />Service cooperative observer sites. The model also estimates costs of <br />mop-up and overtime. * Overtime, paid at time-and-a-half rates, is <br />calculated when recorded snowfall exceeds the amount that foremen reported <br />could be cleared during normal working hours, or when evening or early <br />morning snow is heavy enough to require removal at times other than normal <br />work hours. <br /> <br />Labor costs are conputed only for the time enployees spend removing <br />snow; time spent on other tasks such as road and bridge repair is <br />excluded. Labor of mechanics is included in the "rental rate" applied to <br />each machine. The labor of office staff is excluded because it is <br />difficult to tie their duties to daily amounts of snow. Costs of supplies <br />are also excluded, because they are difficult to determine and because <br />initial estimates indicated that they are insignificant compared to costs <br />of labor and machines. <br /> <br />Snowfall Data <br /> <br />Daily snow amounts, recorded at the National Weather Service <br />cooperative observer site in or nearest the town in which each county shop <br />is located, were obtained from the state climatologist. Records from past <br />winters at approximately the 20th, 50th and 80th percentile of long-term <br />annual snowfall** were selected at each site so costs could be estimated <br />for winters of low, average, and high precipitation. (Sites and winters <br />used in each county are listed in Table 1.) Costs of removal, although <br />estimated from snowfall records in past winters, are based on 1982 wages <br />and machine costs. <br /> <br />*The model was developed on an IBM personal conputer. A <br />diskette are available at the Bureau of Reclamation, <br />Atmospheric Resources Research, Denver, Colorado. <br /> <br />listing and <br />Division of <br /> <br />**For example, "20th" indicates that only 20 percent of the winters of <br />record had lower annual snowfall. <br /> <br />-9- <br />