Discussion on Paper No. 6246: Snow-Clearance Problems on Swiss Roads.

Abstract

port and Civil Aviation) asked the Author to give a more detailed description of what he meant in 0 32(a) by "simple appliances and equipment", particularly the "equipment", since it was necessary to keep all industrial routes open to traffic in Great Britain and these seldom reached an altitude of 2,000 ft. 56.The Author had given a fascinating comparison between snow of various forms.One of the diEiculties in the United Kingdom in the past had arisen from regarding snow as snow and not snow in the many forms in which it could be compacted by successive ploughings and various other operations. 57.Snow-falls such as the Paper described did occur to some extent in Great Britain.A brief glance at the record for 1946-47 would suffice to remove any doubts on that score. The following figures related only to the northeastern area of England between the Rivers Humber and Tweed. During the period 6 January to 16 March, snow-falls had occurred on 41 days, aggregating in that period 60 in. level fall. The maximum individual falls had been of 12 in. on each of two occasions and 27 in. had fallen within 7 days. Severe frosts had preceded the snow by 8 days and continued for 8 weeks, with a minimum temperature of 2°F (30" of frost). High winds had blown throughout most of the period, varying from north-east to south-east in direction. Under such conditions, with snow falling on an already frozen ground surface, there was no absorption and in all areas ploughing operations had piled up snow on areas already deeply covered with snow.58. Winter services in the north-eastern area during that winter had cost f.2,250,000. (Today's equivalent would be about f3,750,000.) That had been on gritting and snow clearing, and when the winter was over, more money had had to be spent in restoring damage caused by frost and floods. 59. Although there had been no lack of snow-ploughs in the country at that time (1,600 had worked in north-east England), the eighty high-wing ploughs used had been far too few and the power of the propelling units insufficient to cope with deep snowdrifts which were numerous and recurring, reaching a depth of 26 ft on major roads in the Pennine area. Superhuman efforts had been necessary to try to keep roads open, but several important roads, including the Lancashire-Yorkshire trunk roads, had been completely blocked for periods of 2 to 6 days.60. The winter of 1946-47 had clearly demonstrated that heavy V-ploughs alone were insufficient, even in England, for keeping roads permanently open, because solid walls of snow up to 12 ft in height were formed by successive ploughing of drifted snow and in many cases two-way traffic could be restored only by using mechanical shovels. Elsewhere it had been necessary to resort to manpower and 24,000 men had been employed to supplement the efforts of the highway authorities' personnel.The experience of that winter would long serve as a reminder of what could happen in Great Britain.f