Though I love the snow, even I am beginning to tire of this weather. And with the Government asking the Council to cut down on the gritting of our roads, to preserve national grit stocks, we must hope the predicted thaw does indeed arrive this weekend.

Despite some stories in the press, Birmingham still has a reasonable amount of grit; plenty for another week of bad weather at least. However with the national situation getting difficult, the Government has set up the ‘Salt Cell’ to co-ordinate use of remaining supplies across the country. The ‘Salt Cell’ is made up of Councils, the Highways Agency, Central Government and Salt Suppliers. Its job is to look at the overall situation and ensure the grit doesnt run out.

All local authorities have now been asked to cut grit use in half to preserve stocks  and Birmingham has done this by reducing the flow rate from the gritters from 20g to 10g. Meanwhile 600mt of unrefined table salt has been bought by the Council. While this cannot be used by the gritters, it will be mixed with sand and used to refill grit boxes and treat pavements where there are resources to do this. This will help the road grit last longer.

So there is a strategy in place to last out the winter, but its at the expense of less grit going on the roads that we would usually have. So lets hope nature comes to our help and melts the ice and snow the normal way soon. And in the meantime a big thank you to the workforce who have manned the gritting lorries, going out night after night, for a record 28 consecutive nights (the previous record was 14 nights). Without doubt they have kept our City moving this past snowy month.