I can understand vehicular chaos on the rare occasion it snows in say southern Texas or similar but I'd think living in the frozen tundra would require that you be able to drive in slippery conditions?
Sometimes conditions can be deceiving. Plus you have new drivers coming in, cars with bald tires, people who refuse to slow down, etc. We had our first snow in the Twin Cities a couple of weeks ago, and it was what they call a "coating". Some areas were blown free of snow by the wind, but other areas were extremely slippery. Seemes like traffic would melt the snow and then it refroze to ice. Especially treacherous, because you would not be expecting it since there was so little snow.
We have had two very minor snow falls, but quite cold. One day set a record for the lowest high temperature, and couple of nights around 0 F.