Kent Highways and the lessons from Monday

Like so many others, I was caught up in the severe disruption to the roads amid Monday evening's snowfall. A journey home from Maidstone that normally takes a little over half an hour took five and three quarter hours. At one point, as I was helping push the car in front of me up an incline, a man turned to me and said, "The council's going to get a lot of complaints tomorrow." I have to admit that I didn't rush to tell him that I was a County Councillor.

This evening, at the Sevenoaks Joint Transportation Board, Kent's Head of Highways, John Burr, reported and reflected on what happened on Monday. He did not say - though he could have done - that neighbouring counties such as Surrey and Sussex were just as badly affected, if not more so, and that the same could be said for the major routes operated by the Highways Agency. He was quite clear that what had happened wasn't acceptable. He emphasised that there was - and remains - no shortage of salt. The lorries had been out several times in the course of the day, and the approach which had been so successful a few weeks ago was repeated. So what happened?

High winds were part of the answer - quite a lot of salt was simply blown away.  The salt was also unable to take full effect on the relatively dry ice (once things started to thaw, it accelerated the dispersal of the ice and snow, but that was of no use to anyone on Monday night). The most intense snowfall came at and just before rush hour. Major routes such as the M2 were closed and traffic diverted onto other roads, and accidents also diverted traffic. (This was my experience: an accident led me to take the A25, not my usual route, and it was there that I spent most of the evening). In turn this made it harder for lorries to get through.

John Burr indicated that he will be leading a full review next week of what happened to see what improvements might be possible for the future. One possibility he raised relates to the point about the salt not really taking effect on the dry ice. It's not a case of complaining about "the wrong sort of snow", but rather of asking whether it would have been better - and might be better in future - to switch under these circumstances to use of sand and grit; not so focused on dissolving the snow, but rather on improving tyre grip.

Looking at the winter as a whole, Kent Highways delivered very well in responding to snowy conditions. On Monday night, despite the hard work of Highways officers, the service was less able to cope with what the weather threw at it, and residents and motorists had a difficult time as a result. There is clearly a strong will to see what can be learned from the experience with the aim of a better outcome next time.