Simply wondering, considering the amount of tax you pay, the other ammenities of your area, and the ammount of snow we have had over the past few years, are you satisfied with the way your council has acted regarding the snow over the past few weeks?

Personally, I don't pay tax to the council (student) so can't really complain, but on the whole ours in Aylesbury, Bucks, have been acceptable in my useage considering everything and the small amount of snow we have had recently.

I know others have had problems, but IMO, I would rather we struggled in the snow a bit for a week, rather than having worse local services for the rest of time.

Joe

Edited 6 January, 201016 yr by TriggerFish

No, not so much as seen a gritter/plough.

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/s/1188166_town_halls_defend_gritting?rss=yes&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+menews+(Manchester+Evening+News+-+RSS+Feed)

Very much displeased.

A few cars out turned the snow to slush, and that then left a thin layer of ice all over the road that is deadly, even if you're walking.

As for the paths, they are a joke inches of packed ice and impassible in many places. The exception being outside a school, where I saw the staff pushing the snow away with snow shovels.

That area was totally fine, so I can only conclude the problems are down to a lack of clearing the snow.

Gritter has been down our road (a minor route) every night this week. It's never going to stop 6 inches of snow sticking tho. Yesterday morning was chaos as there were some accidents round here that caused gridlock. Footpaths in the town centre should have been gritted tho. Was pleasantly surprised when I went to the supermarket earlier and they'd cleared the snow off most of the car park and gritted all the paths.

No problems here, I have got to work and back each day without any problems. Grit stops working when the temp gets to about -5c, so it doesnt matter how much they lay it will just sit on top of the ice. This morning the main routes are all fine, the A1(M) and M25 are all running normally. Local roads were also ok for me, a bit slippy as the melt water caused by the grit had frozen overnight but otherwise fine.

Not seen one gritter in my road. However, where I work pays for the local council to gritt the roads around the establishment, funny how good a service you get for £500 at time...............

Main roads have been kept well clear, there has been an effort to grit housing estates when they can maybe once a week but it helps and I have seen them out gritting main footpaths. For the cold weather we normally get a sufficent fleet to grit everything just would not be cost effective. In canada and other cold weather countries they obviusly have a much bigger fleet, however even here covergae isn't in to all estates and they have the option to pay extra to have these gritted on and individual basis.

Southampton/Eastleigh councils have done a reasonable job. All the main routes i've been on have been gritted, not much done on paths, but i have wellies, so its no problem to me

Preston council suck big hairy balls!

A very half-arsed effort to grit main roads, no side roads gritted at all, no info on where to get grit if residents need it, and now 6 weeks with no rubbish/recycling pick up.

I would very much like a refund, to be honest.

I would rather they properly maintained the roads and made them smooth to drive on for the 360 days of the year where we have no snow, and be stuck 5 days of the year, than for them to spend money on proper snow equipment to clear the roads, to be honest.

I'm not "happy" but I am not displeased. I will be unhappy when all of the roads show the real damage caused by the ice cracking the road surface.

The CC here has even removed salt bins on minor roads. It does not appear tp salt minor roads in this area even though they where routinely done in past years. I would also say that the main roads have received less salt also and inappropriate salting. For instance some of the main roads here were salted before the rain prior to the festivities, the result was that the salt just washed away. then when the freeze came and the snows dropped they reacted late. I beleive that they are laying less salt and that in some areas their is poor planning and meteorological observances. This is not the first year that I have noticed this either. I can not comment much about the rest of the country however but I do have my suspicions. I also feel that with repeated warm winters that their should be a glut of salt! Instead the first call for it to be used in anger for any period of time we all but run out.

We all know that Government and County Councils are looking for ways of reducing expenditure due to the recession. I beleive that road maintenance and salting in particular is what has been cut!

I'm lucky as we have the council depot at the end of our road so everytime the grit/salt lorry goes out the road gets a good splattering of grit/salt, probably gets done about 8 times a day. I can understand that salt supplies are running out due to more severe weather this year, you can't expect your local council to stock huge amounts of salt for every eventuality, the cost would be too much then you will all be moaning of huge council tax bills later this year. As mannyo says rock salt does not have any effect on ice when the temperature goes below -5, I thought it was only -2, any Chemistry experts here?

I think we've been generally OK in Sheffield to be honest - they've kept most of the main roads open and it's only really side roads that are bad. Given the extremely low temperatures and the speed and depth to which the snow came they really didn't stand a chance of keeping everywhere clear.

At least they have tried to be fair with the gritting this year rather than concentrating on the areas favoured by the local councillors. They also havent spread the city centre two inches thic with grit like they did last year (what a waste that was!)

The real problem is people no longer seem to know how to deal with snow here - having had so little of it recently. Russia and the rest of Europe don't shut for three months of the year do they - people just prepare themselves and get on with life (for example how many of us keep our own grit for driveways, carry shovels in the car when it's snowing and go prepared (properly clothed with food, water and warm clothing in the car just incase)?

the council has been cr@p in the Chester area, to slow to do anything, or do nothing at all seems to be their motto

Southampton/Eastleigh councils have done a reasonable job. All the main routes i've been on have been gritted, not much done on paths, but i have wellies, so its no problem to me

They have done a poor job at junctions and nothing at all on a lot of paths.

There is a shortage of salt you know, and money isn't a bottomless pit. Contrary to popular opinion, your brass pays for far more than your bins being emptied and the roads being gritted ! Ours has just leased a new Lexus LS as a mayoral car and funded a town centre regen scheme to name but two things the £ has been spent on.

Our bins are full and the main feeder road for our village is impossible to climb.

I have to park on the main road along with half the other residents.

How do you stand if your car got side swiped and you declared to you insurance company

that it was kept in a garage or on the drive?

How do you stand if your car got side swiped and you declared to you insurance company

that it was kept in a garage or on the drive?

I shouldn't think there would be a problem as they ask where is the car "usually" kept at night. Would be no different from if your stayed away from home somewhere and had to park it on the street.

Our close and the road out of our estate never get gritted but are still passable. Beyond that the major roads are pretty good round here so up to this point I'm happy with their provision.

lots of snow, roads a mess but I do think the Council have done thbest they can with the resources thay are limited too - hate to say this but the problems are due to teh fact that we don't pay enough tax.council tax has been static for a number of years, so effectivly a cut in income and something has to suffer.

council tax has been static for a number of years

Really? It has gone up every year since the year dot down here. And no, I don't think that they've done a good enough job in Cornwall. It's not so much that they haven't gritted/salted (I'm aware of the shortage so wasn't expecting it all to be done), it's that they have claimed that not doing some of the main roads was because they're not used! What a load of crap...

No problems here.

The main roads have all been clear and driveable since the snow started and while all the side streets and pavement aren't , we have had a grit wagon come down ours.

The council have a fixed budget which has to take into account the likelihood of snow and for ten years or more all we have had is a couple of days of snow a year so they'd have been mad to buy more gritters to sit idle. If they had done there would be people slagging them off for wasting money. It never has been the case that all roads are cleared by them and never will be.

If this type of weather starts happening more often then they will need to spend more , but I can't complain about their performance this time round.

Really? It has gone up every year since the year dot down here.

I think the suggestion of it being "static" isn't to say it hasn't gone up, but the increases are in line with the increasing costs of providing the same service.

Council has kept the bus routes gritted so no real problems on the main roads, only day that was an exception was last Tuesday (after the first heavy snowfall) - depth of snow meant the grit was pretty useless.

Rob.

Variable; I've been up and down most of the West Coast of Scotland this last week, and some areas (pretty much everywhere South of Fort William) were good, but North of there things were tricky to horrendous!

Edited 11 January, 201016 yr by KenONeill

Hopeless in Luton, unless it's a main road to be gritted -we live just off a bus route, which they claim is always gritted, but obviously wasn't during the first lot. After many complaints, they have this time.

I've totally lost track of what bin should be collected when.

Phil