Northern grit

Up to six gritting trucks and four snow ploughs keep Hull's roads passable when ice and snow become a major hazard.

Keeping the city moving through the bleak mid-winter is the job of Hull's team of gritter lorry and snow plough drivers.
Ice and snow make roads treacherous to drive on and can block routes to work, college, hospitals and schools.
Which is why the contribution of Andy Dixon and his colleagues is so important.
"We usually plan our start times for early evening, after the rush hour, or early morning, for salting to be completed by 7am," he says.
"But as weather conditions can change rapidly or unexpectedly, we are on call 24 hours a day to report to the depot, within an hour, to start salting."

Ready salted

When plunging temperatures are forecast, the team carries out what they call a 'pre-salting' to get salt on the carriageways before ice and snow settles.
The pre-salting network divides the city up into 14 salting routes and the team can usually get the city salted in around three hours.
They stock up with around 3,300 tonnes of salt during an average winter, and expect to use 2,200 to 2,400 tonnes of it.

Beating the chill

• Salt remains on the road until crushed by car, lorry and bus tyres and is eventually washed away by rain and melting snow.
• The gritting of roads does not block Hull's gulleys or drains.
• Salt is sourced from a company called Cleveland Potash. The firm supplies many other towns and cities across the country.
• 300km of Hull's main roads are in the priority network for salting. These include bus routes and industrial areas across the city.
• Hull City Council monitors the weather forecast three times a day to allow the gritters to have a rapid response.
• The council provides 250 salt bins across the city for self-use by members of the public.