Buffalo County, WI Roof Snow Load - 35 psf
Buffalo County, WI roof snow load, translated
A typical heated home in Buffalo County is designed to carry 35 pounds per square foot of snow on its roof, per ASCE 7-22.
On a roof that means 77 in. of fresh snow, 28 in. once it packs down, or 7 in. of solid ice - three very different piles for the same load. A serious structural load. Homes built before modern snow-load provisions, or with low-slope/flat roof sections, are the ones most worth having checked.
Buffalo County at a glance
- Design roof snow load35 psf
- Ground snow load, ASCE 7 map50 psf
- National rank#169 of 2,758
- Wisconsin rank#34 of 72
- Population13,464
- Annual snowfall, NOAA normal37.4 in.
- FIPS55011
Where Buffalo County ranks
#34 of 72 Wisconsin counties by design load, top 6% of 2,758 nationally - that's Buffalo County's spot. That's 4.1 psf above Wisconsin's own county-average design load of 30.9 psf.
FIPS 55011, population 13,464, centered near 44.3856°N 91.7613°W. ASCE 7's underlying ground snow load here is 50 psf before the code's exposure and importance factors bring it to the 35 psf design figure above.
Buffalo County: average annual snowfall
Buffalo County sees about 37.4 in. of snow most winters, per the ALMA DAM 4, WI US station's 1991-2020 NOAA normal. See the density guide.
Read this before you use Buffalo County's figure
The figure above assumes the case ASCE 7-22 treats as typical: a heated, ordinary-occupancy home on a partially exposed site. Change any of those - exposure, heating, roof pitch, occupancy category - and the real design number moves.
A building permit needs the number at your exact address, not the county average - the free ASCE 7 Hazard Tool returns that from your coordinates in about a minute and produces a PDF a plan reviewer will accept. (How this figure is calculated.)