MATTYDALE -- Wednesday morning was busy one for Central New Yorkers who had to pick up their shovels and dig out from yet another snowfall.

While this one didn't bring as much snow as expected, it did bring plenty of ice and freezing rain. The wintry mix that was too much for the roof of A&A Auto Repair in Mattydale, which came crashing down early Wednesday morning.

Mattydale Fire Chief George Dwyer says the wet heavy snow from this storm was too much for the wood roof. "The way this snow right now is. It is heavier. It is possible it had water damage and the weight of the snow collapsed it," he says.

So much snow has fallen this winter that local DPW crews are having a tough time keeping up. Tim Hunt, commissioner of Cazenovia's DPW, says they've already used almost as much road salt this year than they did all of last winter.

"Ordinarily we plow the roads 120 times a year as of today we've plowed 110 times," he says.

Some Syracuse residents like Marianne Carlucci say they don't need snow plows. Carlucci, who is 83, says she has been using her shovel for just about as long as she can remember.

"My son is 64 and my daughter's 57 and I've been shoveling since they were babies," she says.

More on this story across upstate New York from the Associated Press:

A winter storm that clobbered the middle of the nation glazed the New York City metropolitan area in ice and brought a wintry mix to upstate, disrupting travel and closing many schools Wednesday as it moved quickly into New England.

With images of havoc the storm brought to the Midwest on their minds, New Yorkers woke to find less snow and more sleet, ice and freezing rain than forecast Tuesday.

Kimberly McMahon, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Albany, said a layer of warm air mixed with the incoming storm, causing snow to melt on its way down and either refreeze as sleet or fall as rain that iced when it hit colder cars, trees and roads.

"We didn't get as high amounts of snow as predicted because it was a little wetter, that warm air spread further north," she said.

In New York City's Central Park, pathways looked like an ice-skating rink, about a half-inch thick. Passengers getting off commuter buses along Manhattan's Fifth Avenue coped with treacherous footing and pedestrians shuffled to keep from falling.

Sidewalks in downtown White Plains ranged from clear to slushy to icy. "I think it's safer in the street," said pedestrian Anna Moran as she picked her way down the sidewalk on Court Street.

Motorists sweeping snow off their cars for the morning commute from Saratoga Springs to Albany were pelted with stinging BBs of sleet as the line of snow shifted further north than expected to the southern Adirondacks. A total of about a foot was expected through the Adirondacks, with 2 to 4 inches falling later Wednesday after a lull in the storm.

There were icy roads in Buffalo, but not the knee-deep snow that had been forecast. A few inches of snow were expected later in the day, in time for the ride home. And the National Weather Service had downgraded winter storm warnings to storm advisories for central New York by morning.

Despite the ice, there were few reports of power outages. But heavy snow was blamed for a roof collapse discovered Wednesday morning at an auto business in Salina, near Syracuse. Nobody was in the building at the time.

Hundreds of schools across upstate were closed, many of them for a second straight day. Some have already used up their allotted 3 or 4 snow days and may have to shorten winter or spring breaks to make up the lost days.

Air travel was disrupted statewide and delays were reported on commuter lines in the metropolitan area.

The weather was blamed for at least two deaths in New York. Police on Long Island said a homeless man burned to death early Wednesday as he tried to light cans of cooking fuel while sheltering behind a food market. And state police say a man was killed after losing control of his pickup on a slippery road in northern New York Tuesday afternoon.

With nearly two months of winter left, many upstate residents are resigned to the harsh fact that this is unlikely to be the last major storm of the season.

"I hope it is, but I don't think so," said Kim LeQue of Cohoes as she cleaned snow off her car after finishing her overnight shift at a suburban Albany convenience store.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)