Elected Member Briefing Note 2023, Issue 3
About this briefing note
Report by: Mark Butterworth, Head of Environmental and Consumer Services
Date: 5 January 2023
Subject: Adverse winter weather conditions
Responsible Officer: Stuart D'All, Roads Maintenance Partnership Manager
Details
Purpose
The purpose of this briefing is to advise elected members of the efforts that the Council and Tayside Contracts are taking in relation to addressing the adverse winter weather conditions, particularly in parts of highland Perthshire during the current cold spell.
Briefing Information
As Perth and Kinross residents, Elected Members will have experienced the adverse weather conditions over the last 7 to 10 days, which has seen bouts of snow, rain, and cold temperatures, particularly overnight. This on-going weather combination has led to snow freezing, and compacting on the ground, with further layers of snow falling onto the compacted ice, which makes it difficult to remove, creating very slippy conditions, particularly for pedestrians.
The warmer days, mixed with rain showers, also impact on any pre-grit treatment undertaken during the day. This can often require treatments to be repeated, and this impacts on the Council's ability to treat any routes other than the main priority routes. This is a source of frustration for many residents who feel that their roads require treatment, which we do not have the resources to undertake.
Our ability to treat wider areas has also been impacted upon due to the public holidays, as both the Council and Tayside Contracts only have standby arrangements in place, which means that we cannot call upon the wider workforce to assist on those days.
Looking forward, unfortunately the cold ground temperatures are forecast to persist for the next few days, and even though the air temperature may appear warmer, the ground will still be frozen, and any ice may take some time to thaw. Nevertheless, we will continue to focus on delivering the winter maintenance service in line with the agreed policy, and this will include moving resources around Perth and Kinross, to the areas that require it the most, which are currently in the north.
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