It may not be the most glamorous job, but somebody’s got to do it.

When most of Albert Lea’s population is sleeping or at least inside their warm homes, the snowplowing crews manned by the city are just beginning their day’s work.

Sometimes it’s 2 a.m. and other times it’s 4 a.m., but no matter what time they climb up into their trucks to begin the day’s work, they’re out with one mission in mind: the safety of the public.

Foreman Mick Hanson, who has worked for the city for almost 30 years, said despite how it may look, it’s not difficult to drive a snowplow truck, which has a plow both underneath and in the front of the truck. The vehicle has power steering, and it is able to turn corners sharply and maneuver easily.

Depending on the conditions, Hanson said he drives as slow as 15 to 20 mph sometimes and up to faster speeds if the speed limit and weather allow. His route covers east of Broadway Avenue and south of Front Street, so he gets to know the people who live along the route and what some of the common problems are with his streets.

No matter how slow he drives, the ride is a bumpy and a loud one.

He said it’s his goal to plow as close to mailboxes as possible without knocking them down.

Sometimes, however, because of the force of the snow coming off the plow, mailboxes do get knocked down. But that, of course, is not the aim.

Hanson said the job gets more difficult with traffic or if there are cars parked on both sides of the streets. When that happens over a period of time, crews have to put out no-parking signs on both sides of the streets to allow for a full plow of the road.

Typically with plowing, however, on the first day there is as much curb-to-curb plowing of all the streets in the city. Then on the second day, the crews go out and pick up the snow piled up in the middle of the downtown streets.

Typically, most intersections are sanded.

It generally takes about eight to 12 hours to plow the roads of the entire city that first day, depending on the amount of snow, said street superintendent Scott Overland. Currently, the city policy states the crew will go out when there’s 3 inches of snow on the ground, but with budget cuts that might end up being changed, he said.

Hanson said if it has snowed a considerable amount, and the snow has stopped, the crews start plowing at 2 a.m. If the snow has not stopped, they start at 4 a.m.

While there’s always going to be a debate about what the best snow plow policy is out there, Overland said he’s talked to officials in the neighboring communities of Austin, Mankato, Faribault and Mason City, Iowa, to name a few, and has heard the pros and cons of going to an odd-even system or a no-parking system.

If Albert Lea were to go to an odd-even system, it would require twice as long to do the same job, Hanson said. That means costs would increase.

Not to mention if you’re going to have an odd-even system or a no-parking system, there’s always going to be a high percentage of people who don’t follow the rules, Overland said.

“If everybody did what they were supposed to, it’d be pretty slick,” he said.

Already with the way Albert Lea does its snow plowing, people often still don’t park in parking lots, driveways or garages when they are available, Hanson said.

That creates problems with this system and would create even more problems with another system.

Hanson and Overland said the crews try to educate people about their system when they have questions or concerns.

Overland said he hopes people realize, “There’s going to be a first street and a last street and until we get to the end, there’s always going to be someone in between.”

As a whole, Hanson said, people are pretty courteous of the snowplows, and he hopes people can say the same thing about the snow plowing crew.

Overland said he wants to utilize the city’s Web site and eventually put online what times the crews will be plowing and what the city’s snow procedures are. He anticipated this would happen next winter.

Albert Lea’s snowplow crew is made up of a couple people from the utilities department, a couple seasonal employees and the remainder being full-time employees. There are 17 people in the city of Albert Lea who work to plow the streets, while in Austin there are 26.