Xomw counties : Staffs- get it right.
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If the doom forecasters are right about global warming then the effect on the UK will be worse than what we are seeing now - colder winters more akin to those other countries at the same latitude as us.
Birmingham 52 degrees north
Ottawa 45 degrees north.
Government are not planning for it to happen so why should we accept their statements that it is happening and the associated increases in taxation!
Where is the joined up government?
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Government isn't joined up - it is screwed up!
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It's not joined up Government. It's Councils planning on a mean case.
Mean is fine except you can get 2 standard deviations.
They should plan for 1 standard deviation...
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Some dozy bint on the radio yesterday said, and I paraphrase from memory, "It's shocking that in this era of climate change the councils don't have larger grit reserves."
I was so flabbergasted I nearly drove off the road, but spent a much more enjoyable 10 minutes shouting at the radio.
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They should plan for 1 standard deviation...
They should employ some statisticians/consultants to help them understand the stats.
All you saw/heard them saying was the grit stocks have run out because this is a 1 in 20 year event. In the next sentence they then say the last time so much snow fell was 18 years ago. So maybe they thought they could safely wait until 2011 before an "exceptional snow event" needed to be planned for.
The other interesting fact that emerged was that they all thought because they have a contract with the grit supplier to deliver at 5 days notice, there was no need to worry. Fine, except that the supplier can do that only in the "normal years", not to cope with scores of councils all ordering at the same time.
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They should employ some statisticians/consultants to help them understand the stats.
On about £50k pa do you reckon? It'll cut the dole queue a little I suppose!
TBH I didn't have any problems at all this week, so Worcestershire and West Mids have done ok... perhaps its just that many people now live in out of the places that would have been considerred only suitable for farm workers years ago but are now considered "commuter" suitable these days, which is ok until the weather gets bad and they want their little lane gritted....
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Neither the highway authority councils or the supplier will necessarily have the infrastrucure to cope with exceptional events such as we are seeing now. How is the salt/grit stored? The salt bit must require controlled, probably indoor, storage to prevent both deterioration and leaching into the environment.
Any storage space costs, particularly in recent years where sale for housing would raise significant capital.
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.. On about £50k pa do you reckon? It'll cut the dole queue a little I suppose!
Too cheap. At leat £200k pa all in.
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I am surpised that the rock salt we see is intended to get rid of the snow. News to me- AFAIK it was always only intended to stop the snow sticking to the road so that it could be ploughed off. Proper 'grit' spread onto frozen compacted snow works quite well in continental Europe . However with the temperature bobbing up and down , it tends not to work here.
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It's the lies that annoy me. I've just spent a couple of interesting night shifts knowing that Worcestershire ran out of grit on wednesday evening. I've heard two days of spokeman on the radio talking about 'selective' gritting . No, there's been no gritting because you haven't got any.
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The government bang on about road safety & the use of speed cameras, but something that could actually save a few lives like properly gritting the road & they don't want to know - because it costs them money rather than makes them money.
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The government .. - because it costs them money rather than makes them money. >>
If it costs "them" money, they have to get it from you & I in the end. Because, you may be surprised to know, the Government's money is your money and my money. [ I am assuming you are a taxpayer and not a scrounger. ]
If it makes "them" money, it saves you & I some money as the idiot caught [idiot either because he was speeding and/or because he got caught] breaking the speed limit has to pay "them" the money. That money helps keep a lot of people employed who otherwise would be unemployed and/or busy dreaming up other schemes to get money off you and I.
So good result all round, I say.
Not to hxj: I know, I should not feed a troll; but as Cantona said, just like a seagull, I cannot resist the sardines being thrown in to the sea from the trawler.
Edited by jbif on 06/02/2009 at 15:23
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jbif
Yes.
This idea that the Government just gets money from nowhere is a bit strange.
As anyone speeding through a fixed camera painted yellow is driving without due care and attention (as they did not see it), it's called fleecing the idiots.
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'As anyone speeding through a fixed camera painted yellow is driving without due care and attention (as they did not see it), it's called fleecing the idiots.'
and failing to grit roads when they have collected billions in road and motoring taxes is also called fleecing the idiots.
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