On Wednesday 1st November 2023, colleagues from Amey South-West Trunk Roads were delighted to join Transport Scotland at the Glasgow Science Centre in Pacific Quay for their annual winter launch.  

The event included addresses from Minister for Transport Fiona Hyslop, Chief Superintendent, head of Road Policing, Hilary Sloan, Met Office Markets Director Ian Campbell, and Martin Reid, RHA Policy Director for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Each presentation praised the importance of partnership working over the winter months and the successes of a diverse, multi-agency approach in responding to weather events. Police Scotland and the Met Office will have dedicated staff based at the Traffic Scotland National Control Centre in South Queensferry throughout the winter period to ensure close and effective working between key partner agencies.  

In addition to snow and ice, the event acknowledged the need for more flexibility in Scotland’s severe weather response as flooding and high wind events have increased over the years with thanks given for partner response to Storms Agnes, Babet, and Ciarán. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency will also contribute to the Multi-Agency Response Team to help improve the overall response to heavy rainfall and named storms. 

For Winter 2023/24, Scotland’s trunk roads will be serviced by a fully refreshed fleet of gritters to help keep Scotland moving. With new network management contracts in place for the North-West and North-East units, the entire gritter fleet has now been replaced with new vehicles as part of the improved winter service. Gritter numbers are maintained at a record high of 240. 

All four network management contracts bring increased quality and innovation to the winter service. Including: 

• Enhanced snow clearance strategy and gritter patrols across the trunk road network. 
• Improved snow plans for specific routes, which now cover the Aberdeen Western  Peripheral Route and parts of the A90 around Aberdeen, as well as the M8, M74, M77 and M80. 
• Pro-active treatments of foot and cycle paths.  

Salt barns are full with almost 467,000 tonnes ready for use, which is more than was used across both Scotland’s trunk and local roads last winter. 

Amey South-West Trunk Roads will be once again issuing free Winter Service Alerts. Find out more here.

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