Window Cleaning in St. Michael, MN

A fast-growing city along the Crow River

St. Michael sits along I-94 on the eastern side of Wright County, about 30 minutes from downtown Minneapolis, where the Crow River separates it from Rogers. Downtown, the Gothic Revival Church of St. Michael, built in the early 1890s, still stands at Main Street and Central Avenue and has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1979.

It’s growing fast. The 2020 census counted 18,235 people in St. Michael, and the State Demographer’s 2025 estimate puts it at 22,623, one of only two Wright County cities past 20,000. Newer neighborhoods have gone up near Uhl Lake and Gonz Lake, among other parts of town, and each August the Daze & Knights Festival brings a parade, live music and fireworks to Town Center Park.

Filtered water that’s still hard

St. Michael’s city water comes from the Joint Powers Water Board, which also serves Albertville and Hanover. Its plant filters out iron and manganese, but the water is still rated hard, at 22 grains per gallon, and when sprinkler or hose water dries on glass, those minerals stay behind. Upper glass we reach with water-fed poles gets a purified-water rinse that dries clear, and rings that have already set in get our hard-water stain removal, quoted after we see them.

Transoms, upper stories and sliders

Census survey data puts the median year built for St. Michael homes at about 1998, so roughly half the houses date from the late 1990s or later. Newer homes tend to carry more glass up high: transoms over the front door, upper-story windows across the back and wide sliding patio doors. Water-fed poles handle most of it from the ground, a ladder covers the rest, and track detailing clears the grit where the sliders run.

Summer watering hours

From June through September, the city allows lawn sprinkling only between 7 p.m. and 10 a.m., on odd or even dates by house number. That means sprinklers run in the evening and early morning, and any spray on the windows dries in place. Aiming the heads at the lawn prevents most of it, and the early-fall cleaning is a good time to check whether any spots have set in.