Winter maintenance
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Winter service is an important part of Transport for Buckinghamshire's (TfB) maintenance work. It involves:
- salting major roads when there is a risk of ice
- clearing snow
- reacting to other weather related emergencies
Read more about how we decide when to grit the roads and information about our salt bins.
Gritting routes
There are 3 separate gritting routes, precautionary, snow, and secondary.
Snow routes and secondary routes are the reduced network we revert to these in times of very severe weather.
Precautionary routes
These are the most important routes to keep everyone moving. The routes consist of 1405km of the county's A and B road network, about 44% of the total network.
Snow routes
When heavy snow comes, we may move to a 24hr and focus on the county's most strategic routes (around 22% of the overall network). This will continue as long as it snows (normally around 3 days) during which time only some A and B roads will be gritted.
Once the snow has cleared, we go back to the precautionary routes as soon as possible.
Secondary routes
These may be gritted before a heavy snow or if the snow carries on for a long time. The are done after the primary routes have been cleared and treated.
They include the following highway network:
- classified roads which are not included in the primary salting network
- unclassified roads serving communities of 200 dwellings or more and unclassified roads with a gradient of 10% or less
We may also salt cycleways and footways in main shopping areas and other key pedestrian and cycle facilities. The secondary salting network will be treated after the formation of ice or fall of snow in accordance with the Operational Plan.
Our fleet of vehicles can be tracked on the map below. Some of the vehicles are used on other duties during the day so they may be active on the map below.
Weather warnings from the Met Office
Weather warnings generated by the Met Office Weather Widget
Did you know?
- Precautionary salting covers around 1405km of road
- We have over 1,000 salt bins across Buckinghamshire
- A typical grit run uses 65 tonnes of salt (pre-wet mix) or 85 tonnes if used dry
- We have 25 gritting vehicles across the County