If Swindon’s roads are in a decent condition as snow and ice causes problems elsewhere, a lot of that is down to the work of Swindon Borough Council’s gritting crews.

Overnight on Tuesday and in the early hours of Wednesday the crews were out twice to grit the 210 miles of priority routes the council has identified as being important to grit in freezing weather.

The 210 miles of roads gritted twice represent just under 40 per cent of the borough’s total of 550 miles of highway.

The council said: “We concentrate on treating the routes that are most heavily used, which is around 210 miles of roads.

"Swindon has over 550 miles of roads in total, so those which aren’t treated require extra care when the weather is bad.

“While we do our best, we cannot guarantee the routes we do treat will always be free of ice.

“It costs around £2,500 for all vehicles and drivers to carry out a night’s operation, so it’s important we only do this when we definitely have to.”

On a night’s operation the council typically uses seven of its eight gritting vehicles with one kept as a spare in case of breakdown.

The drivers all have other jobs but fit in gritting around their other duties.

There are two teams of seven drivers each who are on call 24 hours every other week.