Time to rethink snowbound rural roads strategy

Further extensive snowfalls early this week have made a bad situation considerably worse throughout County Meath. Just when locals thought the worst of the freezing conditions were beginning to abate, the weather had a further sting in its tail on Monday and Tuesday with fresh snow making driving conditions on Meath's roads extremely hazardous and virtually cutting off some isolated areas. The freezing Arctic conditions have been with us for at least 10 days, although later this week should see some respite with a rise in temperatures predicted towards the weekend. However, fresh snow is now lying on top of heavily compacted ice on roads, making for very dangerous driving and underfoot conditions in all areas. Monday's very heavy falls of snow, in effect, has undone much of the good work which has been carried out by local authority staff on main roads and in towns in the past week. Councillors have been lavish in their praise this week for county council staff in their efforts to grit roads throughout the county, and have praised council officials for improved communications between council staff and councillors, who were then able to make information available to members of the public. Assistance from the Defence Forces and Civil Defence to the civil authorities has also been of considerable help in clearing snow from footpaths in and around towns and making the entrances to housing estates as safe as possible. While the local authorities certainly deserve commendation for being able to keep main routes and heavily trafficked regional roads passable, a major problem still exists with other secondary routes and minor roads which remain in an extremely treacherous state, and impassable in some cases. Clearly, the focus on each local authority must be on keeping the primary routes open, but the abandonment of others in rural areas is causing great hardship for many rural-dwellers who have been unable to get out of their homes since this spell of bad weather hit towards the end of November. Deposits of salt and grit left by the council at several strategic locations throughout the county for communities to use themselves has been of benefit but surely there could be a more co-ordinated response to get this material to the places it is most needed. Lessons have clearly been learned from the debacle last January when sub-zero temperatures across the country plunged the country into chaos and perhaps one of the debates that needs to take place in the wake of this latest icy weather is how local communities and volunteers could be tasked to distribute salt to the districts within their communities where it is most required. Securing the assistance of local farmers and other members of communities across the county needs to form part of a future strategy at local level to tackle these extreme weather emergencies. There is no shortage of people willing to volunteer to help but, in an overall sense, the work is being done in a haphazard and unco-ordinated fashion whereby volunteers are left to their own devices once the salt is left for them. It is clear that stretched local authority staff cannot ever hope to treat every boreen and cul-de-sac in Meath but a system of teams of properly trained and organised volunteers, using their own machinery, in each parish could certainly make a big difference in rural parts of the county, ready to spring into action as the first signs of a cold snap. Such a system would at least stand a fighting chance of being able to keep rural roads open after heavy snowfall and allow people living in the countryside to go about their day-to-day business. Farmers, in particular, have been hardest hit by this cold spell, with some dairy farmers unable to get milk to market or receive deliveries of feedstuffs. However, these are also the people who are most willing to lend a hand to neighbours in distress in difficult times and who have the type of machinery that is ideal to assist in operations to clear roads. IFA president John Bryan has said he has been inundated with calls from farmers across Ireland who are only too happy to make themselves and their machinery available if grit is supplied by local authorities. Meath County Council has made what salt stocks it has available in several rural areas for communities to use but it is now time to re-think how the rural goodwill which exists in abundance throughout Meath can be tapped into and a uniform strategy rolled out across the county whereby local volunteers are tasked with clearing particular roads in their own immediate areas. Such a collaborative approach, involving the county council, farmers and other members of the community, would mean a more effective way of dealing with adverse road conditions in the countryside when adverse weather hits, but it would also have the effect of giving local people a sense of solidarity and togetherness as well as pride in ensuring that they are the people who have helped keep the wheels of the rural economy moving at a time of crisis.