Highways Agency launches new gritter fleet
New style road gritters are hitting the road this winter as the Highways Agency says goodbye to its ‘yellow army’ in favour of a new fleet featuring state of the art monitoring technology.
The Highways Agency is investing a total of £45 million in a new fleet to tackle snow and ice through the colder months. Initially the new vehicles will be launched in the East of England, East Midlands, North West and Central Southern England (Hampshire).
Their introduction marks the Highways Agency’s move towards use of pre-wet salt, which the agency claims gets to work faster on the road surface to prevent ice formation and is more friendly to vehicles and the environment because less is used.
The first of the new winter service vehicles will be on the roads this Autumn and the total new fleet of 438 vehicles will be in use across most of England’s strategic roads by 2010. The first of this year’s 159 vehicles were launched today (Monday 10 November), at a depot serving the A1 at Sandy in Bedfordshire.
Derek Turner, Director of Network Operations for the Highways Agency, said:
“Working closely with specialist forecasters from the Met Office, the Highways Agency plays an essential role during the winter months by tackling snow and ice, and warning drivers of severe weather. Our new winter fleet gives us the capability to treat the roads more efficiently and effectively when ice and snow are forecast, whilst reducing the impact of our operations on the environment. The new vehicles, which will be on the roads from this Autumn, have cleaner engines and will use less salt through the new pre-wet process. Road users will start to see the new orange vehicles on the roads from this Autumn.
“It’s important to continue to invest in improved services. The new winter fleet has state of the art technology on board and is capable of delivering the latest advances in winter treatment, such as pre-wet salt.”
Highways Agency weather warnings and road information can be found here, http://www.fleetdirectory.co.uk/fleet-news/index.php/category/highways-agency/
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