Iowa weather: Here's why your neighborhood Des Moines street might not be plowed right away

Austin Cannon
The Des Moines Register

An Iowa winter storm can quickly cover streets with inches of snow, but Des Moines snowplows won't be immediately dispatched to your neighborhood road or side street.

That's because the city's plows' first priority is to clear Des Moines snow routes, the 750 miles of arterial roads most residents use to get where they’re going.

“It’s our first and highest priority,” Public Works Director Jonathan Gano said in 2019.

He added that the snow route system was designed so every resident is within four blocks of a snow route. Even some smaller roads are considered snow routes just for that purpose.

Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway, for example, is a snow route plows will prioritize. But the streets to its immediate north, in the central business district and Historic East Village, will be left alone until three hours after the snowfall ends.

Des Moines officials announced Friday that plows wouldn't get out to the neighborhood roads until Saturday because the continuing snowfall has forced plow crews to continue re-clearing the snow routes.

Snow routes, 2018.

The plows can only descend so far. Gano said the goal is to provide a smooth, flat driving surface on the city’s 2,200 miles of road, but some snow could still be leftover.  

If you chose to stay home, good, Gano said. Fewer cars on the road make it easier for the plows to get around.

The goal is to finish plowing within 24 hours of the snowfall ending, Gano said, calling it “unreasonable” to expect the streets to be plowed within a matter of hours. That would require more plows and staff than the city can afford.

The city has 100 pieces of equipment in the snow fleet controlled by almost 200 employees. 

“It does take time to clean up a snow event,” Gano said.