Services
Gritting and Winter Maintenance
How we deal with Roads and Footways in West Lothian
Every winter West Lothian Council has to treat 950 km of roads and around 1000 km of footways to combat the effects of bad weather. The normal period of operation extends from 31st Ocotber - 1st April.
It is important to appreciate that it is not possible to treat all routes simultaneously. In this view, the council must adopt a priority system to ensure that the treatment is targeted to areas of greatest need first.
Where possible, we aim to treat, with grit, major roads and important bus routes prior to the formation of ice. We operate this service 24 hours a day, 7 days a week when necessary. Once these primary routes have been treated, we treat secondary routes such as those in housing estates and rural areas.
We also deal with footways on a priority basis. In ice and snow conditions footways leading to schools, hospitals, health centres, shopping areas and where there is heavy pedestrian movement are treated first. Main routes to residential areas follow, with internal footways in housing areas being treated as resources permit.
In addition we provide over 1600 grit bins, which are positioned throughout West Lothian for use by members of the public.
Service Standards
We will:
- Publish our winter maintenance policy, including treatment priorities and level of service, each year prior to the start of winter maintenance operations (details of our winter maintenance policy are provided in a guidance note);
- Carry out gritting and snow clearing operations on public roads and footpaths in accordance with published policy;
- Provide new grit bins in streets which meet the required criteria; and
- Fill grit bins on receipt of a request as resources allow, or following periods of severe weather.
Contact Details
For: Policy on route priorities; requests for new grit bin or refills; general information/comments on service provision - 01506 775000 (24 hour contact number)
