City road crews have cleared Ottawa's highways and major roads of snow and are expected to clear neighbourhood streets by 1 p.m. Thursday, after the city saw its first major snowfall of the season.

Heavy snow began to fall Wednesday and another 2 cm is expected Thursday, so most of the city will see about 15 to 20 cm fall by Thursday afternoon.

Ottawa and most eastern Ontario school buses were running this morning, though there were delays In Renfrew county school buses for English Catholic and public schools were cancelled, except for Whitney Elementary school.

Ottawa Police say they've responded to eight collisions across the city since 5 a.m. All were fender benders, cars in ditches or accidents in parking lots due to the weather conditions. One woman suffered minor injuries after her car went into a ditch, police say.

Luc Gagné, the manager of road services for the City of Ottawa, said by 7:15 a.m. snow plow crews had cleared the major roads and were a third of the way through clearing residential neighbourhoods.

But he said some slush was still present and cautioned drivers to have windshield wiper fluid in their cars to deal with spray from cars in front of them.

Because there wasn't significant snow on the ground before Wednesday's storm, Gagné said there is plenty of room to clear roads and build proper snow banks.