CITY leaders have reassured residents they have enough rock salt to keep roads clear should further severe wintry weather hit the region again.
The announcement came after local authorities across the country reported experiencing shortages with their salt stocks, including the nearby Liverpool City Council.
Representatives at Salt Union Limited also said they were rationing the amount of salt they provide to councils to conserve salt levels.
But Cheshire West and Chester Council (CWaC) officials say they have sufficient supplies of rock salt to meet the needs for gritting priority routes, based on the Met Office’s two to five day forecast for the region.
CWaC’s fleet of 16 gritting lorries equipped with snow ploughs were put on stand-by after a storm dumped several centimetres of snow on some parts of Cheshire West yesterday.
In the meantime, and to conserve salt stock levels in the borough, other roads will be gritted only where there is a particular safety issue.
And grit bins around Cheshire West will only be filled when resources become available. Salt in these bins is intended for use on the highway network. Residents are being asked not to take salt for their own personal use.
CWaC executive member for the environment, Cllr Neil Ritchie, said: “Engineers and gritting crews have been working flat out to keep roads open. We receive up-to-the-minute weather information from the Met Office and are ready to deal with this severe weather and continue salting in line with our policy to ensure the main roads across the borough remain open to traffic.”
A CWaC spokesman added: “We are in regular contact with the Government Office North West and our salt supplier Salt Union Limited to monitor salt levels to ensure we meet our priority to maintain safe driving conditions on the main routes whilst these difficult conditions persist.”
Yesterday, all transport services, school buses and social services vehicles were running normally, apart from those services to eight schools in Vale Royal, closed due to severe weather conditions.
For more information about the conditions of roads in Cheshire West and Chester go to http://www. cheshirewestandchester.gov.uk/transport_and_roads/gritting.aspx