Winston County, AL Roof Snow Load - 10 psf
Winston County, AL roof snow load, translated
A typical heated home in Winston County is designed to carry 10 pounds per square foot of snow on its roof, per ASCE 7-22. The physics-based figure alone would be 7 psf, but ASCE 7's own low-slope minimum (§7.3.4) sets a floor of 10 psf for flat and low-pitch roofs here, which is the number that actually governs.
On a roof that means 22 in. of fresh snow, 8 in. once it packs down, or 2 in. of solid ice - three very different piles for the same load. A modest addition to standard roof loading. Ordinary residential construction handles this without extra bracing.
Winston County at a glance
- Design roof snow load10 psf
- Ground snow load, ASCE 7 map10 psf
- National rank#1,885 of 2,758
- Alabama rank#15 of 67
- Population23,869
- Annual snowfall, NOAA normal0.2 in.
- FIPS01133
Where Winston County ranks
#15 of 67 Alabama counties by design load, top 68% of 2,758 nationally - that's Winston County's spot. Alabama counties average 5.6 psf; Winston County runs 4.4 psf higher than that.
FIPS 01133, population 23,869, centered near 34.1546°N 87.3653°W. ASCE 7's underlying ground snow load here is 10 psf before the code's exposure and importance factors bring it to the 10 psf design figure above.
Winston County: average annual snowfall
Winston County sees about 0.2 in. of snow most winters, per the ADDISON, AL US station's 1991-2020 NOAA normal. See the density guide.
Read this before you use Winston 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.)