Gritter in Cambridge

Conservative county councillors have been holding a Gritting Review.  Here is a summary of changes we have heard about to date:

Cycleways: good news and bad news:

A quad-bike will be gritting cycleways in the city centre.  This is the good news, but the bad news is that major out-of-town cycleways will remain untreated. Lib Dem councillors are demanding that they are included.

Another positive result is that the Lib Dem campaign to have Mill Road gritted has been successful.

All in all, there is more bad news than good news.  In total, only a few roads (Mill Road, roads inside Addenbrooke’s  and part of Whitehill Road) have been added to the gritting list in Cambridge, and 19 have been removed. In Queen Edith’s, Spalding Way, Gunhild Way and Tillyard Way have come off the list.  This is disappointing. When the Conservatives asked for our views, we hoped for more gritting, not less.

The Lib Dem City Council is doing its part to help in the icy conditions, and has agreed that its staff will do some gritting of roads and pavements when necessary.  I should point out that the City Council’s scope to help is limited.  The county council receives all the government funding for winter gritting, and has specialist equipment and staff.  The City Council has neither, so its team will have do the gritting by hand.

The City Council can also distribute grit around the city for everyone to use: community groups who wish to assist with the gritting of county council highway areas can arrange delivery of small amounts of grit by calling 01223 458204 or via the following mail addresses:

[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]

Central government has recently published guidelines for residents about gritting the area around their homes, accessible here.

There are also major problems with the Gritting Review that need to be looked at before the coldest months are upon us.

The whole city centre has been excluded from the “reduced gritting network”.  This means that if there is a shortage of rock salt stockpiles, as happened last year, the county council’s gritting vehicles will completely stop treating the area inside the inner ring road.  This would be enormously harmful to business, and cut off access to goods and services people need even in the worst conditions.  If the county council had followed government guidelines and consulted with the business community — it has publicly admitted it did not — this would never have been allowed to happen.

It is also a problem that school bus routes have not been considered for gritting.  Again, central government consultation guidelines to consult — this time with education service providers — were completely ignored.  This policy needs urgent reconsideration.

Cambridgeshire Lib Dem councillor’s alternative budget last year would have allowed a lot more money for gritting. If accepted, it would have kept the city centre in the reduced network, funded more extensive gritting of cycleways outside the city core, including Riverside; and made provision for gritting of pavements and school bus routes.

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