About snow removal in Genesee
Genesee sits on the ridges along I-70 around exit 254, in the first range of foothills west of Denver. Denver bought Genesee Park here in 1912 as part of its mountain parks system, and in 1914 moved a bison herd onto it. Those bison still graze the pastures on both sides of the interstate near exit 254, and the buffalo overlook there is a familiar stop. Genesee is not incorporated. The Census Bureau first drew a Genesee CDP for the 1990 census.
Who clears what
Snow removal in Genesee is split between the county and the Genesee Foundation. Jefferson County plows the public roads, and the Genesee Foundation lists the order: Ridge, Trail and Vista first, then the feeder roads Foothills, Montane and Currant, then cul-de-sacs such as Stonecrop, Southridge and Jerome. The county may skip smaller roads and cul-de-sacs, plows lower-priority mountain streets only when snow seriously impedes travel and no melting is expected within 72 hours, and does not plow or sand from 9 pm to 3 am.
The many private drives belong to the Genesee Foundation, which plows them with its own crew once about 3 inches has built up. The drives are split into four routes that start at different points each storm, and the Foundation says a full route takes 4 to 12 hours. Its responsibility ends at the end of each drive, usually at the utility boxes. The Foundation has no agreement to plow individual driveways, so those are up to the homeowner, apart from the townhomes, whose association hires its own driver. The private drives sit in 20-foot easements with about 12 feet paved, so there is not much room to pile snow, and the Foundation notes it cannot always put snow where residents ask.
Terrain and snow
Inside the Census boundary the land runs from about 6,600 to about 8,050 feet, so conditions differ a good deal from one drive to the next. The nearest weather station with published normals, Golden 3SW, sits about two and a half miles to the northeast at roughly 7,450 feet. Its 1991–2020 normal is about 140 inches of snow a year, well above the roughly 81 inches recorded in Evergreen. For a driveway in Genesee, that means planning for frequent plowing, and for clearing the lip of snow left at the end of a drive when Foundation and county crews pass.
