Heard a guy at the Westlake library complaining about lake effect snow totals being off this year

I was grabbing a book at the Westlake Porter Library last weekend and overheard this older fella talking to the librarian about how the official snow totals for Rocky River and Bay Village have been way lower than what he's measuring in his own backyard. He said the NWS is missing the band that sets up right over the lakefront neighborhoods. That got me thinking because I live over in Lakewood near the water and my driveway has been a mess while friends in Avon say they barely had to shovel. Is anyone else noticing a big difference in snow accumulation between the lakefront streets and just a mile inland? Maybe I'm just unlucky or maybe the weather guys really are missing something.

2 comments

2 Comments

ryanh7721d ago

My neighbor across the street in Lakewood actually measured 8 inches more than me last month, and we're only 500 feet apart. I checked the street plowing patterns and realized the wind coming off the lake piles up snow against anything from a fence line to a parked car, so two houses can get totally different totals. Maybe that older guy at the library is right that the official measurements are missing the micro-bands, but it also sounds like his backyard just sits in a perfect wind tunnel (and he might be measuring a drift instead of actual snowfall).

elliot_allen6521d ago

My buddy down in Mentor measured a foot more than his next door neighbor last winter, turns out his driveway funnels snow off the roof like a ski jump and he was just measuring the pileup there.