How To Protect Your Driveway From Being Plowed In After Snow Storm

By Mark Abrams

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - So, when that next snowfall hits the region in the coming weeks, how can you prevent that municipal snow plow from ruining the work you just did clearing out your driveway access to the street?

There's probably nothing more frustrating than shoveling out the driveway and clearing a nice apron area to the street to pull out... And then, along comes the snow plow and pushes a big pile of snow right back in front of the driveway.

"A lot of people don't realize it that the snow plows we use are just the big dump trucks," says Don Cannon, Lower Merion Township's director of public works. "They're not like the plows in the parking lot where they can articulate the plow back and forth and move the snow one way or the other. What we say is that snow is loaded on the front of that plow and it just continually comes off -- driver's side to passenger's side -- or left to right towards the gutter line."

But Cannon says there is a way to avoid having the municipal plow block your driveway.

"If you shovel out a space -- looking at your house to the right side of your driveway -- that would allow for the amount of snow that's on that plow to be, say, discharged in that area before it goes past your driveway that's that much less snow that goes in front of your driveway when the plow comes down."

Cannon insists many plow drivers are sensitive to the work suburban residents do to dig out.