Snow belt

Snowbelt is a term describing a number of regions near the Great Lakes in North America where heavy snowfall in the form of lake-effect snow is particularly common. Snowbelts are typically found downwind of the lakes, principally off the eastern and southern shores. Lake-effect snow occurs when cold air moves over warmer water, taking up moisture that later precipitates as snow when the air moves over land and cools. The lakes produce snowsqualls and persistently cloudy skies throughout the winter, as long as air temperatures are colder than water temperatures, or until a lake freezes over.

In the United States, snowbelts are located southeast of Lake Erie from Cleveland, Ohio, to Buffalo, New York, and south of Lake Ontario stretching roughly from Rochester, New York, to Utica, New York, and northward to Watertown, New York. Other snowbelts are located on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan from Gary, Indiana, northward through Western Michigan and Northern Michigan to the Straits of Mackinac, and on the eastern and southern shores of Lake Superior from northwest Wisconsin through the northern half of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

Portions of the snowbelt are located in Ontario, Canada, which includes the eastern shore of Lake Superior from Sault Ste. Marie northward to Wawa, as well as the eastern and southern shores of Lake Huron and Georgian Bay from Parry Sound to London. During the winter, north-westerly winds cause frequent road closures, with Highway 21 on the Lake Huron coast and Highway 26 south of Georgian Bay as far east as Barrie, Ontario, being strongly affected. The Niagara Peninsula and the north-eastern shores of Lake Ontario are especially hard-hit by heavy snowfall when south-western winds are predominant.

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Wikipedia