EL PASO COUNTY — The El Paso County Commissioners use resident feedback to update the county's snow removal procedures.
Depending on how much snow falls and how heavily the area is trafficked, requests will be granted to let the sun melt the snow.
The snow will be allowed to melt naturally in low-traffic neighborhoods. Plowing in these neighborhoods will occur if more than six inches accumulates.
Heavily traveled priority roads get treated under all icy conditions.
Kevin Mastin, Executive Director of Colorado Public Works, says, "We have found that by coming and plowing roads that have less than six inches of snow we can create longer-term problems with piles of snow that block their neighborhoods."
This policy change will be adjusted if safety concerns arise.
An updated snow plowing policy was also approved for unincorporated El Paso County.
Plowing piles up snow on the side of the roads, which can cause a real problem in neighborhoods because sidewalks get covered in snow, driveways get blocked and cars parked on the side of the road get trapped.
According to Holly Williams, an El Paso County Commissioner, "I've already received a comment from a constituent to please not push snow onto his driveway again this year."
The county will also be adding a new real-time snow plow website later this week.
According to Mastin, this new website will be particularly helpful to residents because "they can see exactly where our plows are at any time where we plowed how long it's been since we've plowed whether we put salt down or put or put sand down whatever the conditions are."
With the addition of the new real-time snow plow website comes another layer of personal responsibility.
Since residents will now have the power to know when the plows are going out and where they will be, it will now be their responsibility to stay out of their way.
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