Item No. 6A ES09118 PART 1 - PUBLIC Decision Maker: Environment - - PDF document

1 Report No. ES09118

London Borough of Bromley

PART 1 - PUBLIC Agenda Item No. 6A Decision Maker:

Environment Portfolio Holder For Pre-decision Scrutiny by the Environment PDS Committee on

Date: 14 October 2009 Decision Type: Non-Urgent Executive Key Title:

WINTER STRATEGY FOR FOOTWAYS

Contact Officer: Peter McCready, Head of Area Management Tel: 020 8313 4942 E-mail: peter.mccready@bromley.gov.uk Chief Officer: Nigel Davies - Director of Environmental Services Ward: All 1. Reason for report 1.1 Members received a report on 1st June 2009 outlining the impact of the severe winter conditions experienced during February 2009 and how the Borough responded to the emergency. Members requested a follow-on report regarding the strategy for treatment of footways during severe freezing weather conditions. 1.2 This report details the current strategy for dealing with winter conditions on footways. ____________________________________________________________________________ 2. RECOMMENDATIONS 2.1 That the Environment Portfolio Holder confirms the approach to prioritise winter service

• perations involving snow clearance of footways identified in the schedule of streets for

treatment contained in Appendix A, including the addition of pre-treatment of footways approaching the Boroughs schools.

2 Corporate Policy 1. Policy Status: Existing policy. 2. BBB Priority: Safer Bromley. ________________________________________________________________________________ Financial 1. Cost of proposal: Estimated cost £330,800 but final costs are dependent on the severity of weather conditions 2. Ongoing costs: Recurring cost. 3. Budget head/performance centre: Street Services 4. Total current budget for this head: £330,800 for 2009/10 winter maintenance service 5. Source of funding: 2009/10 revenue budget for winter maintenance service ________________________________________________________________________________ Staff 1. Number of staff (current and additional): 69.5 fte (Street Services) 2. If from existing staff resources, number of staff hours: 0 ________________________________________________________________________________ Legal 1. Legal Requirement: Statutory requirement. Highways Act 1980 2. Call-in: Call-in is applicable ________________________________________________________________________________ Customer Impact 1. Estimated number of users/beneficiaries (current and projected): Borough wide ________________________________________________________________________________ Ward Councillor Views 1. Have Ward Councillors been asked for comments? No. 2. Summary of Ward Councillors comments:

3 3. COMMENTARY Background 3.1 The Council as a Highway Authority is required under the Highways Act 1980 to maintain the highway, and has a duty to ensure „so far as is reasonably practicable‟ that people travelling on a road are not endangered by snow or ice. The implication of this is that if, for example, a weather forecast provider issues a severe ice warning and the Council does not then salt a known black-spot, the Council could be successfully sued in the event of an accident. 3.2 The responsibility for salting the “highway” is not limited just to the area for vehicular traffic but would also cover areas open to the public for foot passage, including pavements and

• cycleways. However, the legislation does not require an authority to guarantee safe passage,

but only to secure this where it is „reasonably practicable‟. 3.3 In order for the Council to comply with its statutory obligations and provide a special defence in the event of action against the authority for damages, the Council needs to be able to demonstrate that it was not practicable to take further action. The Council has a Winter Maintenance Policy and Plan in place to address these responsibilities, and this is reviewed annually to reflect changes to the highway network, road and footway hierarchy and methods of working. 3.4 Early February 2009 saw a sustained period of cold weather and snowfall, which was the heaviest since 1991, and the worst winter weather seen in Bromley for many years. It resulted in significant disruption to travel, to a range of public services, and to businesses across the borough. 3.5 In June 2009, the Environment Portfolio Holder approved the actions taken by the authority during the severe winter weather conditions experienced during February 2009. However Members of the Environment PDS Committee expressed concerns that the footway network was not cleared of snow and ice in a timely manner and requested a review of these arrangements with a follow-on report establishing how the authority should respond to similar crises in future. 3.6 There are operational differences between the management of winter conditions on carriageways and footways, and it is apparent that the public feel that footways should be cleared with the same speed as carriageways. This was compounded by prolonged sub-zero temperatures during the day and night, over several days, which hindered the progress of snow

• clearance. Many pavements in residential areas were frozen with compacted ice until the

weather conditions improved, with thawing occurring days later. This report explains in detail the different operational approaches taken with snow clearance on carriageways and footways. Carriageway Operations 3.7 The total length of the borough‟s road network is approximately 500 miles, and 196 miles or 40% of the borough‟s carriageway network receive „priority treatment‟ – this includes all main bus routes, roads leading to transport interchanges, and retail centres. Priority treatment is carried out using the Council‟s fleet of nine universal body and permanently-mounted salt spreaders, equipped with snow ploughs, and this is supplemented with seven demountable salt spreaders that are made available to the contractors. A squad of contractors‟ operatives share 24-hour standby duties to deliver this service and are available throughout the winter season from November to March. 3.8 The Council also has arrangements with local farmers during the winter season, who are equipped with snow ploughs, and clear snow from rural parts of the borough. Provision of funding for this level of service is made from the Street Services revenue budget.

4 3.9 The Council‟s policy is to pre-treat (salt) the carriageway priority route network prior to sub-zero temperatures occurring, subject to forecasts and timing of the event of freezing conditions. It is vital that these areas are re-salted quickly, in order to avoid the problem of salt-wash off, when further precipitation and subsequent freezing occurs. During February, an around-the-clock programme was implemented, with revisits to priority routes undertaken as necessary to ensure safe passage. In some cases, roads were treated several times within a 24-hour period. As soon as the priority route network was safe for vehicle use, resources were redeployed onto the remainder of the highway network, and used to clear side roads into residential areas, as well as other minor roads. Throughout the carriageway clearance operation, the number of

• peratives required to maintain the service remained constant.

Footway and Footpath Operations 3.10 The borough‟s footpath and footway network is approximately 870 miles – almost double the treatment length of the carriageway network. In periods of severe freezing conditions, during normal working hours the Council pre-treats pavements in main retail centres and approaches to transport interchanges. This operation amounts to pre-treating approximately 50 miles or 6%

• f the boroughs footpath and footway priority route network before the occurrence of freezing
• conditions. A list of the streets prioritised for treatment is detailed in Appendix A – this list does

not detail the actual extent of treatment but represents the nature of the area for treatment (e.g. near retail centre, railway station, hospital etc). The pre-treatment involves redeploying resources from the street cleansing contractor, with routine street sweeping suspended. There is no additional financial cost to redeploy street cleansing operatives to winter service

• perations, although certain street cleansing duties continue, such as litter bin emptying.

3.11 In the event of severe winter conditions involving snowfall the Council supplements the street cleansing contractor‟s workforce with resources from other highway maintenance contracts. Operations are carried out only during daylight hours, normally between 7am and 4pm treating a secondary route network. The contract arrangements for street cleansing and other routine highway maintenance do not make provision for 24-hour standby; therefore footway operations

• n the secondary route network are only carried out as a reactive measure following a severe

weather event involving snowfall, when routine services are suspended. 3.12 During extreme winter conditions, such as those experienced in February 2009, resources were secured to treat the secondary footway route network and additional areas within school grounds including access roads and parking areas following a request from the Director of CYP in an effort to re-open the boroughs schools. The secondary route network includes other heavily-used pavements, and takes into consideration the special needs of disabled people or

• lder people, particularly in areas such as approaches to hospitals, medical centres, day

centres, and residential homes. A similar approach was taken to treat pavements outside schools, however, in reviewing the way forward from the lessons learned during the February snowfall it is proposed that the footway priority route network for pre-treatment includes „walking bus routes‟ and footways outside schools. Appendix A details the streets (both priority and secondary) for snow clearance and salting treatment operations. 3.13 There are, however, practical difficulties in providing a comprehensive treatment for all parts of such a diverse network, and response times will vary depending upon the severity of the prevailing weather conditions. This level of operation can involve deploying up to 150

• peratives from highway-related contracts, while routine service functions are suspended, and

there is a resulting increase in costs to the revenue budget. 3.14 When the priority and secondary route network pavements have been treated, resources would then be deployed onto the remainder of the footway network, with pavements within residential areas being cleared, in parallel with the approach taken for carriageway clearance. Cycleways that form part of the footway priority network are included for treatment.

5 3.15 During the snow event in February 2009 other contractors, including refuse collection and grounds maintenance staff, were also utilised. Collectively, they assisted with the treatment of

• ther footways, and refilled the 350 salt bins that provide self-help facilities to the public.

Resources also revisited the main priority areas – retail centres and approaches to transport interchanges – on a daily basis. However, because the network of heavily-used footpaths is extensive and weather conditions deteriorated, these locations were assigned just one visit. Progress of this operation was dependent on weather conditions improving quickly; because weather conditions continued to be poor, certain sections of non-priority footway were not visited for several days after the initial snowfall. The remainder of this report will focus on the approaches used to de-ice pavements and clear snow. Equipment and Resources 3.16 The Council‟s method of footway and footpath network salting and snow clearance has been developed following extensive evaluation of the wide range of mechanical and manual machinery on the market, and involves a number of techniques and resources. A common approach used by other Council‟s involves hand-casting salt from the side of vehicles – this requires a large number of operatives, and can lead to mounds of salt accumulating on the pavement rather than being spread evenly. Bromley‟s search for an efficient distribution method has led to the use of purpose-made manual „broadcast spreaders‟, which involves a light-weight and easy-to-manoeuvre wheelbarrow with a spinning mechanism capable of spreading an even and economic use of material, over a long distance, and made from materials resilient to corrosion. The Council currently deploys 30 units to the contractor for their use during the winter season. 3.17 In conjunction with manual salt spreaders, the Council has six quad motorbikes that are equipped with either towable salt spreaders or – recently purchased for the coming season – liquid brine solution sprayers for de-icing. Each quad bike can also be equipped with detachable snow ploughs for snow clearance and salting of wide footways on major pedestrian routes. 3.18 Other mechanical resources owned by the Council for the contractor‟s use include small lightweight motorised mechanical units, equipped with either rotating brushes or snow ploughs. The combination of snow clearance and salting involves teams working in tandem to remove snow using mechanical plant with salt spreading from the wheelbarrow units or by quad bikes, so that hand-casting is kept to a minimum. If snow and ice become compacted, mechanical plant has difficulties ploughing pavements, and this means that a labour-intensive approach, with operatives breaking the ice with hand tools. This was experienced during February 2009, which emphasises the importance of pre-salting pavements whenever possible to assist with snow melt. 4 POLICY IMPLICATIONS 4.1 The Winter Maintenance policy and plan is reviewed annually to reflect changes to the highway network, road hierarchy and methods of working. As the service operates effectively there are no plans for major changes, although following our experiences this year updates to be considered include:  Trialling the de-icing of pavements with brine solution as a pre-treatment option to determine the

• perational effectiveness as an alternative to applying salt.

 Inclusion of the eight „walking bus‟ routes and pavements outside schools to the footway priority network as a pre-treatment measure.

6 4.2 Reviewing the Council‟s winter service strategy and standards for footways supports the Environmental Services Portfolio Plan for 2009/10 to protect the environment and gain improved public perception of the street scene. 5 FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS 5.1 The proposed changes to the footway winter service mentioned under item 4.1 would not involve additional costs because they are included in the service provided by the street cleansing contractor following a suspension of routine operations. 5.2 Given the scale of financial and other resources required to deliver the winter service for footways and the difficulties in maintaining high levels of plant and labour for specialist equipment, 24-hour operations and standby facilities, it is not practically possible either to:  Provide the service on all parts of the footway network at an early stage, or  Ensure walking surfaces are kept free of ice or snow at all times, even on the treated parts of the footway network. 5.3 The overall budget in 2009/10 available for winter maintenance services is £331k, however, the year end spend is dependant upon the severity of actual winter weather conditions. 6 LEGAL IMPLICATIONS 6.1 The basis for the powers and duties relating to highway maintenance is contained in the Highways Act 1980. In particular, section 41 of the act imposes a duty on authorities to maintain the highway and to ensure, so far is reasonably practicable, that safe passage along a highway is not endangered by snow or ice. The term highway also includes footways as well as roads. There is not however an unlimited duty on highway authorities to clear all highways of snow or ice given the qualification of „reasonable practicability‟. 6.2 In relation to the extent of the obligation to take preventative measures to ensure safe passage along a highway is not endangered by snow or ice, the courts have held that it would be impossible for a highway authority to eliminate all risk of ice forming on the highway and while placing almost limitless quantities of salt on the highway could increase protection, it would do so at an unrealistic economic and environmental cost. With this in mind authorities are recommended to adopt the principles in the Code of Practice for Highway Maintenance Management, to adapt them as necessary and to apply them consistently. The Code of Practice contains a specific section on winter service and requires the authority to devise a plan in accordance with best practice, using sufficient quantities of salt and resources to address the foreseeable risks. Compliance with the Code will discharge the Councils legal duties under the Act. 6.3 The Borough‟s policy and plan establishes which routes should be in a programme of treatment involving roads, pavements and cycleways that are of key importance to the local environment. The details of the routes to be treated are contained in Appendix A of this report listing priority footways (pre-treatment) and secondary footways (post-treatment).

Non-Applicable Sections: Personnel Background Documents: (Access via Contact Officer) Report to Portfolio Holder dated 1st June 2009 (ES09061) LB Bromley Winter Maintenance Policy & Plan Well-Maintained Highways - A Code of Practice on Highway Maintenance Management Highways Act 1980

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