The dog park down at Ellis Park empties out fast once real cold sets in, but the regulars who still make the walk every morning need a clear sidewalk to get there, and that's the stretch Snow Dogz has staked out as its own. Clearing the walks between the neighborhood and the park matters here in a way a driveway alone doesn't — a dog on a leash doesn't care about ice, and the person holding the other end of it is the one who has to. The work runs early, timed to the same before-work loop the dog walkers keep whether it's forty degrees or four, boots and paws both needing the same bare concrete to move safely over. Down along the river bottoms near the park, the cold sits a little heavier than it does up on the bluffs, and a sidewalk that looks clear from a distance can still be glazed in the spots the sun never reaches. Getting that right, morning after morning, is less about the snow total and more about knowing exactly which stretch of sidewalk never quite thaws.