Snow of strength
Council wheel out gritters for dry run ahead of winter
Don’t be alarmed if you spotted a fleet of gritters out on the roads last week — it was just a dress rehearsal for the main event.
September brought the last of the summer sunshine and the council’s roads team have been busy with their winter preparations.
The council’s fleet of 41 gritters, 53 snowploughs, one snowblower, 24 tractors and five loaders, were primed and ready to go as the winter stand-by period officially began.
Councillor John Anderson, chair of the Community and Enterprise Resources Committee, said: “Our teams are regularly on winter alert from October to March each year, but 2019 has already signalled a cold front.
“Thankfully we have been ready to go for some time, having completed our full ‘dry run’ in late August while our communities were still enjoying some late summer sun.”
Roads workers set out on all but one of the priority gritting routes which cover 52 per cent of South Lanarkshire’s road network – above the Scottish average of 47 per cent – over the first two nights of this month. These routes include access roads for hospitals, ambulance and fire stations, police offices and schools, as well as roads that give the only access to rural communities and local and district distributor routes in urban areas.
Councillor Anderson added: “We have 35,000 tonnes of grit in stock ahead of the winter period and more than 200 employees trained in winter duties.
“Our specialist weather service lets us plan how the resources at our disposal are used and, as a result, we were primed and ready for the first winter frost.
“It looks like a change to more windy and wet weather may be ahead in the short term, but, we stand ready for the challenges only a Scottish winter can bring.”
Go to www.southlanarkshire. gov.uk and check out the Roads in Winter pages for more information.