Cold weather
Preparing for cold weather
Cold weather - see also
The council is prepared for cold weather this winter. A major gritting operation is standing by, and several tonnes of grit has been given away to local residents and neighbourhood watches.
Gritting main roads and residential roads
In the case of snow and ice on the roads, the borough's network of main roads would be treated as a priority so that the emergency services and public transport can keep running. Smaller residential roads would be gritted afterwards.
Pavements and footpaths
The borough's 460 miles of pavements and footpaths must be treated by hand which is a labour intensive and time consuming process. Particular attention is always paid to entrances outside tube and railway stations, hospitals, OAP day centres, schools, care homes, clinics and nurseries.
Red routes and adjoining pavements
The gritting of borough red routes and their adjoining pavements is managed by Transport for London - these include the A3, A24, A205, A214, A306, A3205 and A3220.
Council services
When there has been heavy snowfall staff who normally work on refuse collections and street cleaning will be transferred to gritting operations. Refuse and recycling collections and street cleaning duties would resume once the weather conditions improve.
Throughout the year we are in 24 hour contact with the London Weather Centre so that we have as much warning as possible if there is going to be any type of inclement weather, including heavy rain, gales and of course snow.With regards to snow and ice, as soon as the alert is raised we begin to put our gritting operation into effect.
In order to make this effective we return to places that have already been treated in order to put down fresh quantities. Gritting will only work if it is done repeatedly because it needs the 'mixing effect' of passing traffic to work properly, especially if there is more than one snowfall.
Roads are relatively easy to deal with because this can be done mechanically using our specialist vehicles. For footpaths and pavements, it needs to be done by hand and this can be a lengthy, labour-intensive process.
