Council says it's well prepared for winter

Cheshire East highways team says it is fully equipped to cope as the winter weather begins to take hold.

As part of the Council and partners' Winter Wellbeing campaign, the authority, armed with stockpiles of salt, an online information centre and modern gritting vehicles, is reminding residents of its preparations and current actions.

Councillor David Topping, Cabinet member in charge of the environment, said: "Winter weather can be a worrying time for many people, especially those who need to travel. We aim to be as informative as possible in the event of severe weather conditions.

"I want to reassure residents that we are well equipped to deal with snow and ice in the weeks and months ahead."

Duty officers receive detailed weather reports, around the clock, during the winter months. These officers then decide if gritting vehicles or snow ploughs are required.

Thanks to Cheshire East highways' online service information centre, gritting vehicles can be tracked live as they salt local routes on the Cheshire East Council website.

Councillor Topping added: "The monitoring of weather conditions here in Cheshire East never stops during the winter months. Gritting vehicles or snow ploughs can be dispatched in minutes in the event of conditions deteriorating quickly.

"Freezing temperatures usually result in gritting taking place twice a day – once in the early hours of the morning and again in the evening – but this can be increased or decreased according the conditions that day. Crews have been sent out regularly over the past few weeks to salt the roads, particularly on higher ground.

"We cannot guarantee that the route will be completely ice or snow-free – what we can do is ensure that every effort is made to keep salt stocks high, monitor weather conditions and take the appropriate action."

Councillor Janet Clowes, Cabinet member in charge of health and adult social care, said: "Frozen roads, as well as the extra hours of darkness, bring obvious additional risks, such as falls and involvement in road traffic accidents.

"For older people, a relatively gentle fall can result in a serious fracture. For Cheshire East's most vulnerable citizens, winter can also mean increased loneliness and isolation.

"With this in mind, I would urge those feeling vulnerable to ask a friend, family member or neighbour to help them out with simple but important daily routines, such as their food shopping or getting rubbish out to their bins."

Cheshire East highways has 17 primary gritting routes with a gritting fleet of 17 frontline gritters, nine of which load directly from the mine, with the others operating from their northern depot. A normal gritting route takes approximately four hours, when treating the network for a forecast of ice and frost. The aim is to complete all these routes before 7am.

The Council has approximately 4,000 tonnes of rock salt stored locally, which is regularly replenished during the winter season - approximately 10,000 tonnes of rock salt is used for treating the highway network in an average winter.

The gritting fleet has a GPS navigation system, which records their location and can be tracked live by members of the public using the Cheshire East highways webpage.