Knop Sand

About Knop Sand

East of Ellinwood, toward the wetlands at Cheyenne Bottoms where the sky fills with birds most of the year, the ground opens up flat and exposed, and that's the stretch Knop Sand clears first once a storm blows snow across it. Rural approaches and long farm drives out that way get the first pass, since drift off open wheat ground can close a lane fast where there's nothing around to break the wind. From the Bottoms the crew works back toward town, taking on the shorter, tighter driveways near Main Street with the same care given to the long rural ones. Steps and walks get finished afterward, by hand, once the equipment work is done for the stretch. Evening usually settles in flat and gray over the wetlands, and the drives this crew reached earlier in the day are still holding open.