They still use that method in Minnesota.
That's only for normal snow. For really deep snow, they bring in the military truck mounted snow blowers. I have a picture of a street sign just poking out above the snow. They had to bring in the blowers for that one. The rest of the time, they just load the snow into trucks, and dump it on the lake. Notice, I said ON the lake, not IN the lake. The lake sometimes doesn't melt until well into May.