This is from the council – Ed
The Isle of Wight Council is repeating its appeal to motorists to not to make unnecessary journeys as the freeze continues to bite.
The road conditions look certain to remain icy and there remains the possibility of further snow, sleet and rain in the next 24 hours.
Highways staff are monitoring the weather forecasts and will make a decision on how to best treat the strategic highway network according to the latest advice from the Met Office.
However motorists should remain aware that roads may remain icy even if they appear to be clear of snow and ice.
After some initial treatment of non-strategic/priority routes, the council has now returned to its winter maintenance plan which is to treat only those routes outlined in the winter plan. See gritting maps below
Conserving salt supplies
Peter Hayward, IW Council head of highways and transport, said: “Following national shortages of gritting salt in January, the Government directed local authorities to conserve salt supplies and have reiterated this for the coming winter.
“As a consequence, the gritting routes were reviewed and we have had to plan how salt supplies are used carefully. The decision was taken to concentrate gritting activity on keeping open the main strategic routes such as highways linking major Island towns and villages and those leading to ferry ports. This has been effective in the current conditions and all of those routes are operating well.
“Once these strategic routes were cleared and adequately salted, we did then treat some minor routes identified as priorities by our highways superintendents who have been working around the clock to co-ordinate our response.
Work on non-strategic routes to be limited
“However our ability to do this work on non-strategic routes has to be limited by our need to preserve salt for more freezing weather we can expect in the coming months. We have to remember that the current freeze is very much at the start of the winter.
“We would not want to jeopardise our ability to treat the strategic network in the future by using our salt supplies on minor roads at this stage other than in exceptional circumstances.”
Gritting Routes
Isle of Wight council Gritting Routes Dec.2010
Image: surreynews under CC BY 2.0
