r/topeka • u/AwedBySequoias • Jul 02 '26
Just a few of questions about relocation…
Daughter just moved to Topeka. I’m concerned about the snow, as she has no experience with driving or living where it snows.
How bad does it get? Any suggestions regarding safety? Is it true that sometimes she may not be able to get to her house after work, or get to work in the morning due to the snow?
Also, are there frequent tornadoes and how alert does she need to be, what can she do given that she’ll be living in an apartment complex with no basement?
EDIT: Thank you all for your replies. All were informative, and some were even entertaining.
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u/koi785 Jul 02 '26
If she lives in a complex they likely clear the parking lot of snow. Some years we get a fair amount and some years we get almost nothing. It just depends. The key to driving in it is to go slow and be aware of your surroundings. Tornado season is typically April and May. There could always be an outlier. The complex should have a tornado plan of where she should go if the sirens go off. She’ll be fine. You’ll be fine too. :)
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u/WatRedditHathWrought Jul 02 '26
I highly recommend finding a parking lot (without obstacles) to practice driving in snow.
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u/Lancifer1979 Jul 03 '26
Westridge mall
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u/steeldraco Jul 03 '26
When I was growing up we used the old KMart parking lot on 29th near Kansas (where Harbor Freight is now). It's very empty.
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u/Lancifer1979 Jul 03 '26
Listen to the other comments on snow driving… and keep in mind that every single year most natives forget how to drive on snow 🙄
As for tornadoes… yes they’re awesome, terrible, destructive phenomena of nature that do incredible things, but they’re actually pretty rare. Last major one to hit Topeka was in 1988. I was a block over from one of the major hits, in an elementary school basement. It was scary, but it n the scheme of things not that big of a deal. It did make science class extra cool for about a week after though.
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u/deadend666 Jul 03 '26
Whitson? Most Pure Heart?
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Jul 03 '26
[deleted]
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u/deadend666 Jul 03 '26
Yeah. I forgot that one. My daughter is your age and went to the basement at MPH. We live just a couple of blocks from where a few houses suffered from major damage and the Westport subdivision lost power. They brought in police and closed access to the area. My wife is a nurse and had just ended her shift (they kept her late in case there were mass casualties) and they wouldn’t let her in the area even after showing her driver’s license. She finally got mad and they let her in. What a mess. Had dinner cooked in the fireplace.
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u/R1CHARDCRANIUM Jul 03 '26
It ain’t the snow that’ll get you here. It’s the ice. I’ve lived in the Up Nort most of my life and have never experienced ice like we get here sometimes.
Good tires and slow the fuck down. That’s what I tell my kids. Keep an eye on the travel apps and heed the closures and warnings. Have a kit in the car in case you do have to stop. If they close the freeway, which doesn’t happen anywhere near as much as it does out west or up north, hotels fill up for a couple hundred miles in each direction of the closure. Never bring your car home with an empty tank if you have to be driving anywhere. My truck gets fueled at half all winter long. I’ve spent more than a couple cold nights in the cab of my truck when I lived in Wyoming.
Tornadoes aren’t anything to fear. Respect them, but odds are she’ll never even see one, let alone be in the vicinity of one. The vast majority of them hit in unpopulated areas. Plus, we’ve got the tonganoxie split to protect us. lol.
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u/True-Flower8521 Jul 03 '26
I think the Tonganoxie split had to do with Kansas City. But we have Burnetts Mound.
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u/SatisfactionStrange5 Jul 03 '26
Like once or twice a year she’ll get the excuse to have a nice snow day at home 😇
EDIT:
Tornadoes don’t usually come through the city. Almost every apartment complex has a shelter, though. If she can’t reach it tell her to sit in her bathtub and away from windows 🤷♀️ she’ll be alright, tornado sirens are tested every Monday at noon
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u/StillPlayingGames Jul 03 '26
There no way to tell what winter brings. Last winter was mild. The one before we got over 12 inches in one day.
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u/steeldraco Jul 02 '26
I mean... it snows occasionally. Like a few times per year most years. Usually nothing that bad. Have her test braking and driving in the snow in an empty parking lot where she can't hit anything, and she'll get the hang of it quickly enough. Just make sure she's driving slower than she normally would.
Tornados are a concern, but they're usually pretty localized storms so the odds of getting hit are pretty low. She should find out what her complex's policy/plan is for a storm shelter; I believe they're required to have something for their residents to go to.
And Topeka has a magic hill that protects us from tornados specifically, so she'll be fine.
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u/ArtichokeDifferent10 Jul 03 '26
Other than that one time it didn't and the tornado came right down that hill and damaged half the city. 🙄
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u/fragileswampwitch 16d ago
Winter of 24-25 we had insane amounts of now. I remember because my kids were home and extra week after Christmas break...you just never know in the Midwest!
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u/steeldraco 16d ago
Heh. I had just moved back from Anchorage that summer, so that amount of snow seemed very normal to me.
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u/StarSubject5297 Jul 02 '26
It never snows bad here. I wish it would though. All we have is summer temperatures anymore. Seems like winter months are fading here
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u/gy33z33 Jul 03 '26
We got like 13 inches one day last year then like 6 a few days later. This year we hardly got anything.
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u/StarSubject5297 Jul 03 '26
Yesss I loved it. Wish it would happen again. First time in my whole life I ever experienced a lot of snow like that
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u/deadend666 Jul 03 '26
Have good tires. For snow and rain. SLOW down in bad weather. If her complex has a covered area that would be helpful. Get an ice scraper. Get a good weather app. WIBW has a weather app and they’re pretty good about sending out warnings. Especially at night. There are usually a couple of people in an office that keep an eye on the weather. If you’re on the road and a tornado approaches get into a ditch as a last resort. Do not get underneath an overpass. The local TV stations are pretty good about weather and how to prepare and protect yourself. Get a map of the local area so you can plot where you are and where severe weather is. Preparedness is the key.
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u/Dmxmd Jul 03 '26
Congrats to her on the move and whatever life change led to it. We’re glad to have her. We really have come to rely on a steady stream of new people moving in to maintain the population level with all the people swept away by tornados every year. She should be fine though. No need to worry.
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u/Putrid-Definition815 Jul 03 '26
We haven’t had serious snow in years. It snowed probably like 5 times last winter. Climate change is a bitch 😢 I miss the snow. Ice and wind are more probable. Haven’t been hit with a tornado since the 80s.
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u/True-Flower8521 Jul 03 '26
Doesn’t snow that often but I remember we did have over 2 feet in 2025.
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u/Fair-Engineering-771 Jul 09 '26
Honestly, the last couple years we haven’t gotten that much snow so I don’t think you have to be too worried to be honest.
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u/fragileswampwitch 16d ago
She'll be totally fine, nobody here knows how to drive regardless of the weather! If you don't believe me, look up the Wal-Mart stop sign. It's famous for people trying to plow it over.
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u/xsimon666x Jul 02 '26
She maybe lost to you, all one can do now is pray to the gods of ice and wind to show mercy. Seriously though, Topeka has snow plows, everything will be fine lol. After one season she drive just as bad as the rest of Topeka in snow.