We are in the middle of winter and even though it is quite warm on some days for the time of year, it often freezes at night as well. We regularly see them driving around, gritters on main roads, bicycle paths, public transport routes, access routes for emergency services and of course on the highways. Snow, sleet, frost and fog can cause serious problems on Dutch roads. The road authorities in the Netherlands are busy with it every year. Rijkswaterstaat prepares itself well every year for winter conditions. She wants to prevent the development of slippery conditions due to winter temperatures and ensure that the more than 3000 kilometers of highways are easily passable. If there is a risk of slipperiness, preventive salt is sprinkled on the highways to prevent slipperiness. In the Netherlands we have a slipperiness reporting system, also abbreviated GMS.
GMS is an electronic system to detect smoothness. With this system, sensors under the road measure the temperature of the road surface, the humidity and the salt content on the road. In the Netherlands there is a national icing system. This means that measurement results from measurement points on municipal, provincial and national roads are collected in a bundled manner. Rijkswaterstaat decides whether or not to use the information that comes from this system, in combination with the weather forecast. It takes about two hours between the decision to start spreading and the actual spreading of the roads themselves. Rijkswaterstaat works together with provinces and municipalities. There are 3 types of slippery conditions, condensation slipperiness, precipitation slippery and wet road freezing slippery. To prevent and combat this slipperiness, salt is sprinkled. We have 56 locations in the Netherlands with salt stocks, snow plows and spreaders. The salt can do its job best when traffic drives into the salt on the roads.
Photo above: Image Bank Rijkswaterstaat.
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