Gritters on standby as Torbay prepares for freezing weather

As winter takes hold and temperatures drop, National Highways and Torbay Council have set out how they will keep major routes across Torquay, Paignton and Brixham moving during severe weather.

A nationwide winter operation is already underway, with 530 gritters on standby across England after covering more than 1.5 million miles last winter – the equivalent of driving around the Earth more than 60 times. Teams could spread over 250,000 tonnes of salt in the months ahead to keep strategic roads open.

Across Torbay, the council’s own winter crews will focus on a network of primary salting routes, identified through thermal mapping and split into four priority levels – red, blue, green and yellow.

Red routes are the coldest and highest risk, meaning they are treated first during both precautionary and reactive gritting runs.

Torbay’s red-route gritting roads

The highest-priority roads include key access routes in and out of Torquay:

• Albany Road (Shorton Valley Road to Windmill Road, Paignton)

• Ascension Way (Windward Road to Beechfield Avenue, Torquay)

• Avon Road (Marldon Road to Torridge Avenue, Torquay)

• Barchington Avenue (Barton Hill Road to Kingskerswell Road, Torquay)

• Barton Hill Road (Barchington Avenue to Kingskerswell Road, Torquay)

• Barton Hill Road (Hele Road to Barchington Avenue, Torquay)

• Barton Hill Way (Barton Hill Road to Browns Bridge Road, Torquay)

• Beechfield Avenue (Barton Hill Road to Browns Bridge Road, Torquay)

• Bascombe Road (Dartmouth Road to Churston Road, Brixham)

• Bellever Tor Drive (Huccaby Close to Summercourt Way, Brixham)

National Highways: keeping South Devon’s strategic roads open

Darren Clark, Severe Weather Resilience Adviser at National Highways, said their work goes beyond clearing snow and ice:

“Our work through the colder months is about more than just keeping traffic moving – it’s about keeping the country connected. Our network of 4,500 miles of motorways and A roads are the backbone of the nation’s supply chains, ensuring life-saving medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, fuel, chemicals, and food reach every corner of England, even in severe weather.”

National Highways teams carried out 23,000 gritting runs last winter and reviewed 2,500 weather forecasts, using insights from more than 200 monitoring stations to plan over 900 treatment routes.

Despite five named storms and temperatures dipping to -9.2C in places, the network remained open and resilient.

Between December 2024 and February 2025, there were 67,768 recorded breakdowns nationally, prompting a reminder to drivers to check vehicles, plan journeys and prepare for bad weather.