Inquiry launched into City of York Council’s gritting of roads and pavements (From York Press)

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Inquiry launched into City of York Council’s gritting of roads and pavements

9:31am Tuesday 5th January 2010 in News Photograph of the Author By Mike Laycock, Chief reporter

Head teacher Dan Bodey watches pupils catch their school bus home as Fulford School is forced to shut

AN INVESTIGATION is being launched into City of York Council’s gritting of roads and pavements, as the Arctic blast tightens its grip on the region.

With further snow expected tonight and tomorrow, York MP Hugh Bayley says he is concerned about the ‘lethal’ state of some pavements and wants to meet with the authority to discuss how it can improve its gritting service.

York Hospital says its emergency department has seen an increase in activity as a result of the snow and ice, including more patients arriving with fractures and sprains.

Meanwhile, almost 2,000 children who returned to school in York yesterday went home again within hours – because of heating problems.

Fulford School said it had to close at lunchtime because the recent unprecedented cold weather, combined with the Christmas closure of its fuel supplier, meant it had used up its reserves of oil. It said a delivery was expected today and some children facing exams would return today, with the rest able to return by tomorrow.

Westfield Primary School closed at mid-morning yesterday because of boiler problems, with head teacher Tracey Ralph saying she hoped it would be able to re-open by tomorrow.

Coun Denise Bowgett, the Labour chairwoman of the council’s Safer City Scrutiny Committee, said it was going to investigate the authority’s current gritting policy, which she said had let down many residents and needed overhauling as quickly as possible.

“Judging by the number of telephone calls/complaints I have received over the Christmas holiday period, this is clearly an urgent and important issue,” she said.

“I would invite residents from all over the city to contact me and tell me their story and the problems they have faced so that my committee can understand the extent of the council’s failure.”

Another Labour councillor, Ken King, claimed the snowy weather of the past fortnight had taken the council by surprise and it had still not caught up.

“Many pavements remain treacherous, and seem to be secondary to the road when it comes to the safety of their users.”

Green councillor and York Cycling Champion Andy D’Agorne said he was pressing for key off-road cycle routes to be gritted and made safe. “Only two days ago, I looked at the one through the barracks to the university and it was a sheet of packed ice,” he said.

Mr Bayley said he felt local authorities had “taken their eye off the ball” over the New Year bank holiday, when gritters had been slow off the mark.

But City of York Council said full grit runs had been made at 3pm, 6pm and 11.30pm on December 31, and at 3am, 5.30am, 3pm and 6pm on January 1.

Coun Ann Reid, executive member for neighbourhood services, dismissed Mr Bayley’s comments and said the council had a process for interpreting specialist weather information it received and it gritted roads whenever those processes dictated that they should.

She said she would be happy if there was a review of the council’s gritting policy “in the light of the exceptional conditions we have been experiencing”.

Winter salt bill hits £358k

COUNCIL chiefs say they have spent hundreds of thousands of pounds on gritting this winter – and further bills are likely later for repairs to roads damaged by frost and salt.

City of York Council said it spent £302,000 on salting and ploughing roads last month, and has already spent a further £56,000 this month.

North Yorkshire County Council and East Riding of Yorkshire Council said they did not yet know how much they had spent, although the former said its winter highways budget was in the region of £7.5 million and variations from this could be catered for.

“We are receiving salt supplies and have been assured by our salt supplier that we will get all that we need,” said a spokeswoman, adding there would be damage to the road network once the snow had cleared and the scale of this was being assessed.

Meanwhile, Yorkshire Water is urging visitors to stay well clear of frozen reservoirs, saying they may be tempted to walk on thin ice below which there is likely to be very deep and extremely cold water.

City of York Council's gritting information>>
Including details of which roads and footpaths are gritted, and the location of salt bins in York.

Comments(49)

runnermatt says...
10:02am Tue 5 Jan 10

Thanks for putting my mind at rest Reid “the council had a process for interpreting specialist weather information it received and it gritted roads whenever those processes dictated that they should”. I knew you were only following procedures, unable to sway or react “in the light of the exceptional conditions we have been experiencing” and of course totally blameless. Hang your head in shame, if you have nothing useful to contribute, better to say nothing and let people think you a fool rather than comment and remove all doubt (to coin an old hackneyed phrase)