Severe weather driving
I had to drive down to Dumfries yesterday on a family matter – and all I can say is that the next time I see a severe weather warning – I’m staying at home!!
When a particular strong and heavy snow shower drifted in from the north on Sunday morning, I figured on main roads being ploughed and gritted.
After all, I saw a plough/gritter go past my home on Lochloy Road 3 times within an hour – so obviously the council was on top of it?
I live on a bus route, and I’ve already read it reported that these are not prioritised, instead with major trunk roads being targeted first.
In fact, reading the following article on the BBC the day before, filled me with confidence that traveling across Scotland in snow shouldn’t be much of a problem:
Why doesn’t Scotland grind to a halt when it snows?
I should have listened to the mantra “don’t believe everything you read!”.
Snow on the A9
Conditions on the A96 were pretty tight, but I figured the Highland Council would have the A9 pretty clear.
It was therefore a complete shock to find the A9 even at Inverness was mostly snowed under, with only meagre tyre marks in the slow lane marking out any road.
Driving was treacherous – there was multiple times when the car started to slide out of control, or the wheels started to spin – especially if you strayed out of the tyre marks left by proceeding traffic, which were being filled with snow almost as fast as it was being flattened.
Luckily because of the low speed in the first place it was easy to regain control before any situation becoming dangerous. Certainly helped keep the adrenaline going, though.
Much of the time was spent in huge lines of slow moving traffic, but even that could rarely make a lasting mark in the snow – the A9 didn’t become anywhere remotely clear until near Perth, but was still subject to fierce and dis-orientating snow storms onwards into Stirling.
Driving from Nairn to Stirling took me 6 hours, and according to the car averaged 25 miles per hour!
Incompetence at Glasgow
I expected it to be plain driving from Stirling to Dumfries – after all, the worst of the weather was behind, right?
Sure – excepting that apparently someone had forgotten to send the gritters along the A80 motorway link at the Glasgow end.
That’s the major dual carriageway connecting Glasgow to Edinburgh through the central belt, and is effectively a motorway in all but name.
As soon I came off the M80 it was just one huge gridlock, as lorries slipped on the ice trying to climb the otherwise gentle hills, and other lorries broke down for being queued up too long, resulting in massive traffic jams in both directions.
Result? It took 3 hours to get from Stirling just to the M73 turn-off – a distance of roughly 20 miles. And the first ten miles were pretty normal speed.
Luckily the M74 was kept very clear – Lanarkshire Council had gritters running pairs so that you could even use the overtaking lane safely – as some very impatient lorries that had made it through Glasgow were very keen to use.
It looks as though nowhere was spared travel chaos, though – Inverness, Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Manchester, and all London airports have suffered closure because of the snow, rail travel is reported disrupted.
I had considered my own travel as “essential” – I’ll think twice and harder about that next time a severe weather warning comes up when I have a long journey planned.
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I think you will find that Bear are responsible for the trunk road network, A96, A9,
The Ice not only is causing problems on main roads what about the little roads.
Especially the roads next to the schools.
I was coming down lodghill road very slowly and a child ran out from between the cars that were parked on my left.
( This is a yellow line road no parking between 6am and 8pm)
As there were a lot of children around I was going very slow.
However I was startled and stood on the breaks and went into a skid on the ice and only by the grace of god missed the child.
I still wake up at night seeing that child running out in front of me.
I am amazed that nothing is done, I now hear that the traffic warden is retiring and he will not be replaced because due to the little amount of tickets he gave out it is deemed not necessary.
I think the opposite I feel we should have 2 wardens then if one is lazy like our present warden then he would be shown up by the other.
The local residents, who claim that they are worried that if we get Temp wardens from Inverness, they will not be as lenient as Sandy, also shock me.
Will they still say this if a child is killed?
This is pure laziness or perhaps Sandy is just to shy and not the type of fellow to upset people by giving them a ticket.
What ever it is we deserve to have a real traffic warden who will keep this road clear.
It is a thin street, it is a bus Route, it is the main entrance to the school, it has yellow lines and no parking between 6am and 8pm but no one cares.
I even know of people who work near by and park there daily because they know they will never get a ticket.
Something has to be done before a child is killed, the quicker Sandy retires the better.
I think Sandy is a great asset to the community – it’s not many places where people not only know the name of an on-duty traffic warden, but also feel happy to say hello to them.
He’s certainly pulled me up a couple of times – once for parking across a driveway entrance on the school run (5 minutes!) and for not displaying an up to date tax disc (I often forget to put the new one in).
Each time felt like a friendly but final warning, and I’ve certainly tried to take more care since.
I think the bigger problem is simply Nairn itself – it’s a town packed with cars and many, many, small streets. I think asking one person to be the warden over all of that is asking a lot.
Even still, I do see him active quite often – directing traffic, not least around the high street when one obstruction or another causes traffic flow problems.
I know what you mean about the roads near the schools, though – Millbank itself was a mass of icy peaks and troughs and felt like off-road driving – and being ice, close to the school, certainly made it dangerous. Obviously, Millbank is only a bus route in term time otherwise it would have been gritted properly from the start.
Perhaps that’s a policy the council may want to revise in future.
Brian
I do not mean to knock Sandy he is an asset it the way you say.
Yes he is a nice man a really nice man.
Yes he will direct traffic yes he will move you on.
There lies the problem, he will move you on and not give you a ticket, and we all know that.
So because the only danger is being moved on people park where they want and only move when he comes to move them on.
It is not only the problem of the traffic warden it is the problem of Nairn people who think they can park where ever they like regardless of restrictions.
Yes Sandy is a nice guy and because of that people take liberties.
As for bus routes lodge hill road is a permanent bus route not just during school, and it is a dangerous road many times I have turned into lodge hill from Wellington road and met a bus turning off Cawdor street .
When this happens I have to reverse up the street to let the bus pass as he can’t reverse back onto the high street.
The sad thing is the traffic warden has been stood there watching, and there were school kids everywhere.
The simple answer would be to have double yellow lines from Cawdor street to the doctors surgery but they wont do that as all the toffs who live on this street would complain.
So we have to live with our nice traffic warden.
Think about it do you think the people of Inverness, Edinburgh, Glasgow or Elgin refer to their nice traffic wardens no they curse them upside down because they do their jobs.
So next time you are up near the classroom look up Lodge hill road, look at how thin this road is then imaging it with cars nose to tail parked on the right hand side on the yellow lines and on the zig zag lines.
Then picture a buss driving up it whilst cars are coming down it.
Now visualise children everywhere and think of our nice traffic warden.
Now think due to the lack of tickets dished out it has been deemed that we no longer need a full time traffic warden.
So who will keep the road to our new accident and emergency room clear for ambulances?