As the season changes, we will talk more and more about the "snowbelt". We reference it as a region that may receive more snow in a given forecast. This region has earned the name "snowbelt" as it usually picks up more snow, on average, through the winter. Lake Erie and Lake Huron are both moisture-source regions that supply the extra snow to the area known as the "snowbelt".
The snowbelt is downwind of both Great Lakes (Lake Erie and Lake Huron) and as long as the conditions are right, lake effect/enhanced snow can form within it. It takes warm lake water in combination with cool air flowing over the lakes to produce the precipitation. If you have the correct situation, snow will form and fall over a large part of Northeast Ohio and Western Pennsylvania. The wind speed and direction will determine where the snow will fall.
Breaking the snowbelt into counties may be an easy way to figure out if you live in the snowbelt or not. Here is a list of counties that are in the viewing area, but not in the traditional snowbelt. Keep in mind, even though your county may not be in the snowbelt, it can still receive lake effect snow. If the bands set up correctly, heavy snow is still possible in these locations given the right environment.
Here are the counties in Northeast Ohio and Western Pennsylvania that are not in the "traditional snowbelt":
Columbiana, Mahoning, and Stark in Ohio. Lawrence and Beaver in Pennsylvania.
There are a few counties that border the snowbelt and are sometimes called the "southern snowbelt" and they are:
Portage(OH), Trumbull(OH), Mercer(PA).
On average, the northern half of each of these southern snowbelt counties will experience heavier snow totals than the southern half during a given winter season.
The counties that are in the "snowbelt" are:
Lake, Geauga, Ashtabula in Ohio. Erie and Crawford in Pennsylvania.
These snowbelt counties will average from 80 to well over 100 inches per winter season.
The snowbelt, in general, is north of Interstate 80 and stretches to Lake Erie.
