Current Deputy Mayor of Tallinn Vladimir Svet (Center) has put the cost of performing this role at €27 million, with no certainty on where these funds will come from.

"The good news is that we agreed to end the snow removal 'servitude' in Tallinn," Isamaa's lead negotiator Riina Solman told ETV news show "Aktuaalne kaamera" (AK).

However, Jevgeni Ossinovski, Solman's counterpart from the Social Democrats (SDE), tempered her apparent enthusiasm by noting that taking over snow removal from private owners as a political goal may be all well and good, but it will not prove realistic to complete this across the entire city ahead of the next local government elections.

First, he said, it is not possible to simply switch out existing snow removal contracts on a whim.

Speaking to AK, Ossinovski said: "I would refrain from stating very concretely how quickly we can do things."

"This undoubtedly noble political goal, which we have always backed, will require substantive contemplation and analysis, including budgeting, to see how quickly, in which districts, in which parts of the city and on what types of sidewalks we can start moving ahead with first. "

"It is simply not realistic to do this in all places at once," Ossinovski went on.

Ossinovski said that in more outlying residential areas like Lasnamäe or Mustamäe, with their long and wide sidewalks and thoroughfares, road maintenance could be organized quite affordably.

However, the Old Town is a different story; snow removal primarily entails manual labor, requiring more time and money, he went on.

Deputy Mayor Svet said there are two options facing the next city government.

The first would be for the city to cover all the costs.

The second option would require a change in the law which would permit the city to organize tenders, whose winners would then have to sign contracts with apartment associations or property owners.

Svet said: "The difference between these two solutions is that if the city wants to manage this itself without changing the law, it needs to pay for it.

"How much this will cost is the key question. Our previous calculations have revealed that in the case of a deep winter and thus a need to remove a lot of snow, the total service cost could come to around €27 million," Svet went on.

In response to this, Ossinovski said: "These calculations have been made with certain assumptions in mind, mainly regarding the amount of manual labor required."

"I think a very detailed analysis, whether by districts or types of sidewalks, has yet to be done, so that's now the next step," he added.

In recent years, the city has gradually been taking on maintenance from private owners, especially on sidewalks adjacent to public transport routes.

According to Svet, Tallinn is now responsible for about 60 percent of snow removal.

The remainder is still the responsibility of private property owners, be they residential or commercial.

This system means private citizens have to get out and clear snow themselves, potentially facing a fine for not doing so, work which includes sprinkling grit (often provided by the city) and knocking down icicles, as well as shoveling the actual snow.

The upshot is often a very uneven journey along a single sidewalk as one passes a property whose owners are particularly fastidious in keeping the route clear, versus those who will not, or cannot, do the work – and all stages in between.

Clearing the roads themselves is the task of firms contracted by the city, but even this is not uniform, given the variety of different street widths, traffic flows etc. in the capital.

The next local election is in October 2025 meaning that, even as the current winter still is not quite done, there is one more winter to go, before polling day.

The ongoing SDE-Eesti 200-Reform-Isamaa negotiations are around 80 percent done, Ossinovski has said, meaning an agreement may arrive next week.

A new city government was triggered by the passing late last month of a motion of no confidence in Mihhail Kõlvart as Tallinn mayor, meaning the end of the Center-SDE coalition in the capital.

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