nice side zipper, water proof boot

Good boots!

After considerable research, both online and in brick and mortar stores, I decided on these boots for my everyday use as a Security Officer for a well-known Armored Car company; that's 5-6 days a week, 12 months a year. Occasionally I drive, but usually I'm on foot as an armed escort, so I do quite a bit of walking in all types of Midwest conditions. Belleville's TR960z boots look professional (neither too plain or overly stylized), they are definitely comfortable on my feet, and they fit as expected, even for my wide (2E) feet. Unless you submerge your feet in water over the ankle, they'll keep your feet basically dry, and are great in moderately cold to moderately hot weather; I'd say around 20-80 degrees F, depending on the socks you wear with them. The soles are pretty good for almost all but the most slippery of surfaces, (like ice or our restaurant customer's kitchens) and the tread seems pretty resilient, in that after about a year I still have the majority of my depth and grip. The toe, heel, and outside edges don't easily scuff, and after taking a plethora of beatings, I can still clean them up nicely with a Kiwi sponge. The toe box is rigid enough that you can drop something with some weight on it without worry, but these do not have steel reinforced toes, just to be clear. But just as a reference, I've had boxes and bags of rolled coins weighing anywhere between 15-30 lbs. dropped on my toes dozens of times without incident. I've really come to like the convenience of fast zip style boots, even to the point of having a standard pair modified to add one. For this boot, however, the zipper is the problem. The zipper's interlocking tracks are not vertical, but follow a curve. After two pairs, it's my opinion that this will almost inevitably cause the zipper to break. Even after taking my second pair with a broken zipper to a professional, they questioned why any company would unnecessarily curve the interlocking tracks, when a vertical path (and perhaps bigger locking teeth) would most likely prevent 90% of these kinds of problems. These good boots would be great if they fixed that one issue, so enjoy them until the zipper breaks. In my case, it was about 13 months for the first pair, and 11 months for the second pair. Of course, you could always have the zipper professionally repaired/replaced, but it costs almost as much as replacing the boots themselves entirely.