Service Limitations
Despite the resources that are applied to providing the winter service, ice-free roads cannot be guaranteed. The motorist should remember the following:
- Approximately 80% of roads are NOT routinely salted.
- In Ireland there are a high proportion of marginal nights when temperatures are very close to zero. This makes it more difficult to accurately predict frost than in colder countries. As a consequence Met Éireann can only guarantee 80% accuracy in their forecasts.
- It can take up to 3 hours to salt a route, so any journey may start or end on an untreated section of the route.
- In heavy rain, salt can be washed away and the wet surface may subsequently freeze if the temperature falls below zero.
- In cases of extended severe weather events, the network salted may have to be reduced to Priority 1 routes.
Winter Maintenance Schedule
Meath County Council provides the following winter service:
- 24/7 monitoring of road conditions from the middle of October until the end of April, using detailed predictions provided by Met Eireann, roadside weather stations, and ice prediction software.
- A fleet of 11 dedicated spreaders is used to spread salt on a strategic network of 800 kilometers of Priority 1 and 2 roads whenever road frosts are forecast. This network is detailed in the map above.
- 11 lorry-mounted snow ploughs for use during significant snow/sleet conditions.
Priority 1 Routes
Priority 1 routes refers to all National Primary and National Secondary routes within Meath. These routes are treated during all weather events.
Mobilisation time: 1 hour
Treatment time: 2 hours
Priority 2 Routes
This refers to all of the regional roads in Meath (as shown in the gritting map). These are treated as part of the normal winter service but may have interruptions to treatment in certain severe weather events.
Mobilisation time: 1 hour
Treatment time: 2 hours
Funding
Gritting of the following motorways that run through Meath is taken care of by private entities:
- M1 (Dublin-Belfast)
- M2 (Ashbourne Bypass)
- M3 (Clonee-Kells)
- M4 (Dublin-Sligo/Galway)
Funding for the salting of the National Road network is provided to us by Transport Infrastructure Ireland.
We make limited resources available from our own maintenance funds for the salting the regional routes. In exceptional circumstances other roads may be salted when assessed on a case by case basis. Our resources are fully utilised and there are no plans to increase resources at present.