The state statute does not use the word snow, and the section people cite for it is about lanterns. The local codes are clearer, and one of them puts the contractor on the hook by name.
Clearing a driveway without putting the snow in the road is part of what an independent operator is hired for. This site introduces the operator; it drives no plow.
The statute Wisconsin municipalities rely on is Wis. Stat. § 346.94(5), “Placing injurious substance on highway”: “No person shall place or cause to be placed upon a highway any foreign substance which is or may be injurious to any vehicle or part thereof.” The section never says snow. Municipalities apply it to snow pushed or blown into the road, and a frozen windrow across a lane fits the words. Behind it sits § 86.022, “Obstructing highway with embankment or ditch,” under which willfully placing “any obstruction in any public highway intended or calculated to impede or incommode the use of such highway” is a misdemeanor carrying $10 to $100.
The section that is not a snow rule is § 86.01. County pages elsewhere in the state cite it for snow, and it gets copied from one municipal page to the next. It is the lantern statute: materials left in a highway after sunset have to be lit within an hour. It says nothing about snow and was not written for it. Anyone citing § 86.01 for a snow violation has cited the wrong section, and this site cites § 346.94(5) and § 86.022 only.
Every Waukesha County code that addresses the subject bans it. The wording is what differs, and three of them are worth reading closely.
“No person, their agent, employee or contractor shall deposit, cause to be deposited or permit the deposit of any material on any street, alley or pedestrian way in the city without permission of the city engineer.” Snow and ice “must be removed immediately” on order. It is the one ordinance in the county that reaches past the homeowner to the person driving the plow.
Snow “shall not be deposited onto the paved roadway, including any curb and gutter section. No person shall be allowed to generate snow mounds in the public right-of-way causing visual obstructions and no person shall deposit snow past the curb line or edge of the roadway pavement nearest their property.” Subsection (b)(3) allows a permit from the DPW director, the only snow-pile permit found in the county.
“Residents are required to keep snow off the roadway when shoveling, plowing or snow blowing,” and then the instruction no other municipality gives: “Snow from your driveway should be placed on the right side of your driveway as you face the street.” The pile on the right is the one the street plow passes before it reaches the apron, so it does not get pushed back across the drive.
“No person shall deposit, place or cause any snow or ice to be deposited on any public sidewalk, street or right-of-way in the village.” The village’s DPW page adds an exception for hand shoveling within two feet of the curb; that clause is not in the codified text as returned, so treat the code as the rule.
Elm Grove’s § 243-15: snow from private property “shall not be deposited onto any fire hydrant, mailbox … paved right-of-way, public sidewalk, or other public place.” Menomonee Falls’ § 90-67(c): “No person in the course of removing snow or ice from any private property shall cause or permit such snow or ice to be placed or left on any public way.” Merton’s § 198-5C bars snow “on any public sidewalk, street or right-of-way.” Wales’ § 419-8F: “No person shall place snow upon any public street, after the same has been cleared of snow.” The Town of Oconomowoc’s § 260-26A is the broadest: “No person shall cause to be deposited snow or ice from his private or public driveways or parking lots … onto any traveled portion of streets or driveways, private or public, except his own private premises.”
Where the code could not be read, the municipality’s own page says the same thing. The City of Waukesha lists “Snow placed in the street” among the violations it bills for. The Town of Brookfield says “Shoveling or plowing snow into a public roadway … is a town code violation,” though its section number was not located. Hartland: “Snow should not be shoveled, plowed or blown into the street.” Oconomowoc: “Snow may not be put into the street or across the road.” Menomonee Falls’ page: “Snow should not be shoveled or blown into the street.” Sussex asks residents to clear around the mailbox “but avoid pushing snow into road.”
A plow that clears a driveway by pushing everything out the apron and across the street has broken state law and, in Brookfield, a village ordinance that names it personally. So a driveway contract should say where the snow goes: which side of the drive, how far back, and what happens when the piles get too tall to push over. On a lot with a septic drainfield or a well head, which is roughly a third of the county on the county’s own 2005 figure, it should also say where the snow does not go. New Berlin’s right-side rule is a sensible default anywhere, for the reason the city gives.
Delafield’s wording is the one to keep in mind when the piles grow, because it bars mounds “causing visual obstructions” in the right-of-way as well as snow past the curb. A pile at the end of the drive tall enough to hide a car backing out is its own violation there, and a hazard everywhere.
The berm the street plow leaves across the apron is the reverse problem: the municipality putting snow on the driveway. No ordinance addresses it and no page in the county says whose it is. The berm page covers that.
Say which side of the drive has room, whether there is a drainfield or well on the lot, and which municipality the house is in.
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