Gritting and snow clearing

Gritting and snow clearance are services that form part of our winter maintenance plan, helping to minimise delays and accidents caused by frost, ice and snow.

How quickly we can grit roads depends upon local conditions, snow depth and traffic.

How we decide when to grit roads

Our gritting teams receive regular forecasts from MeteoGroup UK (a weather prediction organisation). Once we are notified of potential snow and ice our gritting teams are ready to swing into action, day and night.

The main road networks are treated with grit throughout a 24-hour period, although most of our gritting action takes place at night when there is less traffic on the roads. The frequency depends upon the severity of the weather.

Find out how we decide when to grit

Which roads and pavements are gritted?

It's impossible to grit everywhere so our priority is to treat all major roads. This will to keep the roads clear with minimum disruption for travellers.

We do not grit footpaths as we have to make sure our gritting supplies are used to keep main roads clear. However, our teams are often taken off other jobs to manually clear footpaths of snow and ice.

We manually grit council owned car parks and areas around bus stops.

Find out how we prioritise gritting routes

View a map showing the main gritting routes

How you can find out when we are gritting

During winter weather we provide gritting updates every time the gritters go out. Gritting updates can be accessed via our social media channels. You don't need to hold a Twitter or Facebook account of your own to access this information.

View our social media channels