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Severe Weather update from City Centre Neighbourhood Manager, Mike Penny
03 December 2010
Current action to combat the effects of the severe weather in the city centre
Update from Mike Penny, City Centre Neighbourhood Manager - 3rd December 2010
Now that the snow has stopped falling we are looking at what best to do next. The forecast suggests that it will remain at or below freezing for the next ten days at least, so our priorities for the city centre are currently around getting pavements safe for pedestrians.
Today we have 29 Task Force operatives working on gritting pavements in the following priority areas:
Leith St
Waverley Bridge
High St
Princes St
Dundas St
Cockburn St
Market St
Lothian Rd
Environmental Wardens and PSG staff are clearing access routes to Winter Wonderland and some of the areas inside the Scottish Market. They will also clear the Princes St/Waverley Bridge junction.
We have secured some additional resources through external contractors and Lightways (the Council's Roads contractor) to assist with snow and ice clearance. 12 Lightways operatives are clearing Castle Terrace for tomorrow's Farmers Market, undertaking some further ice clearance around the Usher Hall and then on to Castle Street for the Saturday Market there.
I anticipate that we should have a further 36 (48 in total) staff for tomorrow morning, who will start at around 7:30 to clear ice from Princes Street to George Street (four squads with a block each). What we have asked is that ice is piled up with a view that it will be collected and dumped away from the streets (looking at either Kings Stable Road depot or the Caltongate site as possibilities, although may take it down to the Waterfront). For Saturday we should have around 30 or so of our own Task Force, who will work in areas in the Old Town (Grassmarket, Candlemaker Row, Victoria St, West Port and areas at the top of Leith Walk.
We also have 1 Litter Press vehicle to service bins/waste issues and we will look to the night shift to concentrate on these throughout the area.
Roads staff will be working through the weekend to co-ordinate all this activity and Dave Sinclair and myself will also be on call.
