Travel warnings as Storm Gerrit batters Britain

Travel warnings as Storm Gerrit batters Britain

Let’s speak to Dale hipkiss he’s national network manager at National highways who joins us now live from Birmingham Dale welcome to you how much traffic is there on the roads right now compared with normal yeah uh good afternoon in the roads are looking busy especially the bwise as you’ve already alluded to

People getting back to normality after the festive period um yet the Met Office have got some uh yellow warnings out for wind and rain over the next couple of days so we are expecting uh challenging conditions over like I say today and tomorrow uh for all regions are there

Parts of the country now where you are actively advising people not to travel well we’re encou we’re actively encouraging people to plan ahead in uh plan your journey well in advance and allow additional time um as it stands the motorways are holding up quite well uh we’ve got the M48 close of strong

Winds in the southwest and in the Northeast we’ve recently reopened the a1m near cck which was closer flooding um we do have there is a fair degree of surface water out there so L say we’re encouraging people to to drive to the conditions allow additional time uh to

Complete the journeys uh take some uh essential kit with them some water some warm clothing Etc a fully charged phone if they do come into any uh difficult situation to phone the emergency services and presumably be uh prepared at all times to come off the roads if

Necessary and uh take take time adding the services absolutely absolutely we’re running a campaign currently for called trip which is um to top up uh any essential your fuel your oil Etc take rest every two hours uh where possible uh give you keep yourself fresh uh inspect your vehicle before travel uh

And just prepare for what’s ahead Lo say the weather conditions is what people are going to face at the moment and are there parts of the country right now where the traffic is is pretty heavy I mean anecdotally I’m hearing the parts of the m6 are pretty busy around some of

These s oftwn shopping Parks yeah well that that’s what we said we expect people to be returning to normality a little bit now following the festive period so cities it’s going to get busy around the cities and with the weather that’s only going to add to congestion and that’s why we’re saying

Ader to the overhead signal so therefore for your safety uh to keep everyone safe and allow that additional time uh and just just keep those essential items with you Dale how complicated has the position become now that everyone has a satnav apps are pretty ubiquitous in terms of showing motorists how to avoid

Congestion does that mean that some parts of of of of the country may see heavier traffic volumes than normal as everyone sort of seeks to avoid travel spots potentially um like I say yeah obviously the technolog is there and readily available for people now who may need to take alternative routes uh for

Us planning ahead is essential so they can see these before they hit the road and obviously we have the technology with the overhead signals to keep them informed on their Journeys there’s radio stations there obviously uh you know they might have passengers for so to check our social media feeds um so we

Are working with technology and hopefully that technolog is working to our advantage and in terms of uh Scotland obviously see we’re seeing a lot of snow in Scotland just now yeah I didn’t catch the end of your question thenan so I’ll I just saying um How concerned is National highways about

The position in Scotland just now where there’s obviously a lot of snow to add to uh the Wind and Rain exactly we obviously we manage the motorways in England but we work very closely with traffic Scotland and if that’s we we’ll sign if if we need if

They need us to assist them um if that does that weather front does come any further you know safe towards us El will be adequately prepared um to react as we need to and what about uh the highways authorities themselves obviously Everyone likes to take time off at this

Time of year are the highways agencies uh less sted as heavily as they might be at other times of the year right now our operational front is 247 365 days a year um yeah operations doesn’t rest there may be certain areas of the business

That can take um a day or two off over Christmas but ourselves in operation and our regional uh counterparts we yeah it’s a 365 uh days a year kind of operation good to hear Dale hipkiss good to talk to you this afternoon thank you

Motorists are being warned to plan their journey and allow extra time to travel as Storm Gerrit brings strong winds and rain.

The Met Office has issued yellow weather warnings across the UK and some roads have been closed.

Dale Hipkiss from National Highways told Sky News the roads were busy and people should take extra precautions before embarking on their journey.

#skynews #weather #travel

Read more here: https://news.sky.com/story/uk-weather-live-updates-travel-disruption-expected-with-wet-and-windy-warnings-in-place-as-uk-braces-for-storm-gerrit-13038118

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