Top 20 Best To Worst Plowed Towns In Worcester County, Part 2

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We do a lot of complaining at Turtleboy Sports, particularly when it comes to the craptacular job that the City of Worcester does plowing, sanding, and treating the roads. But is Worcester really that bad, or are we just being dramatic? To find out we had to conduct a scientific study by doing a tour de turtle done ride through 20 different towns and cities in Worcester County, taking pictures and documenting how each town and/or city did clearing their roads for drivers. Obviously we can’t get to every town in one bone ride, so we have to divide it up into a northern/western bone ride (which we did yesterday) and an eastern/southern bone ride (which we’re gonna do the next time God buries us in white shit) . We apologize in advance if we can’t document your town, and on this ride we just missed getting to places like Templeton, Lunenburg, Ashburnham, Winchendon, New Braintree, and West Brookfield.

Last month we did a bone ride through 20 different towns and cities in Worcester County (mostly northern and western WC) to see which towns are best and worst at plowing their roads. North Brookfield, Worcester, Spencer, Hubbardston, and Leominster were particularly craptacular, while places like Westminster, Brookfield, and West Boylston were spick and span. We wanted to do another bone ride to the east and the south to see if anything compared the vast kingdom of North Brookfield. So we hit up the following 20 places and ranked em 1-20:

Lancaster, Clinton, Boylston, Shrewsbury, Northboro, Westboro, Hopkinton, Upton, Grafton, Northbridge, Uxbridge, Douglas, Webster, Sutton, Millbury, Charlton, Sturbridge, Southbridge, Dudley, Oxford.

We apologize if we just missed hitting your town, but obviously we had to cut it off somewhere. Sorry to turtle riders in Lunenburg, Shirley, Ayer, Bolton, Berlin, Hudson, Marlboro, Southboro, Mendon, Blackstone, and Millville. We’ll get you next time. And yes we do realize that Hopkinton is not in Worcester County. We just have a sizable audience in that particular town because we tend to send a lot  turtle gear that way. Let’s say how they looked…..

 

1. Southbridge

We shit on Southbridge all the time because we call it like we see it. But the fact of the matter is they do a great job with their roads. Which is a good thing, because the thought of being snowed in and stuck in Southbridge is absolutely terrifying. The funniest part is that when you look at the rest of the pictures in this blog it’s mostly blue skies and sunshine. But since Southbridge is the Charlie Brown of Central Mass, clouds literally never leave there.

 

 

2. Westboro

Like Westboro isn’t gonna take care of its roads. This is what it looks like when your property taxes actually pay for things that benefit taxpayers.

 

 

 

3. Hopkinton

I like my roads slush free. But a little here and there isn’t the worst thing so long as there’s some asphalt for me to get some grab onto. I wanna see that asphalt baby!! Show me that asphalt!! And let me tell ya, Hopkinton isn’t shy about flaunting it!! Dat asphalt!!

 

 

4. Oxford

Oxford always does a bang up job with their roads.

Which people in Dudley probably really appreciate because it’s how they get to the highway. Here’s Dudley-Oxford road in Oxford:

And here’s that same exact road a quarter mile of away in Dudley:

Nuff said.

 

 

5. Northboro

A couple years ago when we did two of these tours Northboro was ranked #1. It’s still pretty good, and better than most of the towns west of Worcester, which are plowed like third world countries. Just stiffer competition to the east.

 

 

6. Upton

Y’all gon make me plow this snow, Upton here, Upton here!

Terrible, I know.

But the roads are pretty good in Upton. Some random patches of slushy crapy here and there, but for the most part it’s smooth sailing.

 

 

7. Uxbridge

A couple years ago when we did this we had Uxbridge ranked a lot lower and we got a lot of butthurt Uxbridge blowback about it because they said it was windy that day. Definitely better this time around. There were some streets that could’ve used a little run through just to pick up the scraps, but as long as your car doesn’t feel like it’s invading Belgium in 1944 it’s good enough to get the job done.

 

 

8. Millbury

There were some parts of Millbury that were really shitty.

Some that were OK

And others you could eat a meal off of.

Altogether they do a pretty good job in Millbury.

 

9. Shrewsbury

I guess I expected Shrewsbury to be higher on the list. I mean, it’s better than Worcester, but what isn’t? The brand name “Shrewsbury” just carries a certain weight to it so you expect to it be top 3 in everything. I understand that less trafficked side roads are gonna have more crud, but how does 140 still have all this shit on it?

 

 

10. Webster

Tale of two towns in Webster. Some roads were pristine:

Others were so Webster it hurts.

 

 

11. Douglas

When we did this a few years ago Douglas was the best and it wasn’t even close. We were so looking forward to the smooth drive through this sleepy little town yesterday. And a lot of parts lived up to the billing.

But at the same time a lot of the roads were just very un-Douglas-like.

 

 

 

12. Lancaster

I mean, you can see some asphalt in Lancaster. But it’s not enough asphalt to really grab onto and go for a ride.

 

And some roads are more modest and keep their asphalt hidden at all times.

 

 

13. Northbridge

Northbridge was weird because the side streets actually look pretty decent.

But the main roads? Not so much. I blame Celia.

 

 

14. Grafton

When I think of Grafton I think of nice things. It’s one of Turtleboy’s favorite towns. And periodically it lived up to its billing.

But roads like that were few and far between. And many of them looked like Frosty the Snowman took a shit and forgot to flush.

 

15. Boylston

Route 70 and 140 are alright in Boylston, but those don’t count because they’re state roads. Everything else in Boylston, which is also one of Turtleboy’s favorite towns, looks like a Swedish baby’s diaper.

 

 

16. Sutton

Just like with Grafton you’d occasionally see roads like this:

But if General Patton invaded Sutton and came across most of this town, he’d say, “fuck it, let’s just go around them this time.”

 

 

 

17. Sturbridge

Another town that Turtleboy holds in high regard. But apparently they used equipment from Old Sturbridge Village to clear their roads this time around.

 

 

18. Charlton

The last 3 are in a category of debauchery on their own. Although I kind of like it that way. If every town was smooth sailing it wouldn’t be very fun and it would be a pretty boring blog. I wouldn’t wanna have to commute through this slip n’ slide every time it snows, but i makes the bone rides way more exciting. I feel like I’m in a video game when Im driving in Charlton. It’s like riding on the roller coaster at Whalom Park. You know there’s no regulation and there’s a good chance you’ll die, but YOLO.

 

 

19. Dudley

I thought Dudley would be dead last, because anyone who’s ever been to Dudley knows that the official policy of the Dudley DPW is “fuck it.” But believe it or not there is one place that is worse than this:

And that place would be………

 

20. Clinton

I mean…..what the hell is this?

This is Main Street!! Clinton is the smallest town landwise that we went through!! It’s got the least amount of square miles to cover. And at no point did we come close to seeing any asphalt on this entire magical journey. We got this guy spinning on everywhere:

We got cars all over the road because they have no idea where the double yellow lines are:

Traffic barely moves because people insist on driving cars that suck in the snow.

So yea, if you were looking for another reason to avoid Clinton, this is it.

It could be worse. You could live in North Brookfield. But at least in North Brookfield they don’t pretend to care.

How are the roads in your town? Anyone out there living in a town we did not get to think their roads are worse than Clinton?

 

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