It was -19 C this morning. I drove through the city center to the big lake to the north of it and took a few shots.
I'm guessing there is a district heating pipeline that has been repaired and that they're now repairing the pavement.
The old bus station is on the right on the othe side of the crossing.
This was taken at about 8:15 am. The days are getting longer. The length of day is now 8 hours 49 minutes. It's getting longer by a few minutes per day.
What a cute little tractor!
That machine is called tiekarhu ("road bear").
The lake has been completely frozen over for a month or so. The ice didn't have time to thicken very much before the heavy snowfalls. The accumulation of a lot of snow on a thin layer of black ice (primary ice) insulates the black ice from the frigid air causing it to grow much more slowly in thickness than otherwise. The weight of the snow does cause cracks in the ice leading water flooding to the top of the black or clear ice. The wet snow freezes forming a layer of secondary ice on top of the primary one. This type of ice contains air bubbles, which makes it weaker than the primary ice. This year, lake ice is mostly secondary ice. On average, such ice is half as strong as primary or black/clear ice.
The district of Niemi is on the opposite shore.
It seems that a lot of people have been walking and skiing on the ice. Notice how the tracks get are darker in the beginning. That's because of the layer of secondary ice which is basically frozen slush extends to close to the surface of the snow.
The Finnish Environment Institute publishes up to date information on ice thickness in various lakes:
https://wwwi3.ymparisto.fi/i3/tilanne/fin/Jaanpaksuus/Jaanpaksuus.htm
There are no measurements of ice thickness in this lake but they do measure the thickness of the ice in Lake Päijänne (a much larger lake to the north of here) over one of its main bodies of water (Tehinselkä) where the ice is typically thin in the beginning of the winter.
In a measurement done the day before yesterday, the total thickness of the ice at the point of measurement about 90 km to the north of here was 32 cm, which is more than enough to carry the weight of a person and most likely a typical car. It must be noted though that driving anywhere else but on official ice roads is extremely foolish as the thickness of lake let alone sea ice can vary greatly. There is a high risk of death and a zero chance of insurance covering any losses.
Over a smaller lake 50 km to the northwest of here, (Pääjärvi, Lammi) the thickness of the ice was 25 cm where it was measured the day before yesterday.
This particular street had a lot of snow on it today morning.
I like the pastel colors.
It was somewhat foggy in the morning and it had snowed a bit during the night.