Like other Front Range communities, the city does not typically plow side and residential streets since the resources and staff required to cover the 100s of miles of residential roadways is well beyond what can be funded. In most cases, motor vehicle activity and the sun will make most residential roadways functional before city plows can get to them.
With more significant snow events, once primary and secondary routes are relatively clear (travel, turn and bike lanes and bus pullouts), resources can be reallocated to residential streets. This brings its own set of challenges. Many local roadways are narrow and large city trucks can only clear a single center lane, causing large amounts of snow to be piled against parked cars and creating snow walls across driveways. This can make it tough for people to access their vehicles or the road. Most residential streets are driven on prior to resources being available and plow trucks will only be able to clear loose snow and apply de-icer to intersections. Packed snow will remain on off-route streets even after trucks have plowed the street.
The city began its conditional residential street plowing program in 2014, incorporating select streets that were prioritized based on an analysis of residential street slopes and shade. This program is funded from a 2013 voter-approved tax initiative that provides additional transportation funding from 2014 through 2030. When the forecast calls for eight or more inches of snow or three days of temperatures below freezing, the city deploys trucks to plow residential streets in predetermined areas with steep slopes or a lot of shade (see map). However, if Boulder experiences significant snow followed by several days of below freezing temps, the result can be layers of packed ice, and the city's equipment can't break up packed ice.