An online round table exploring how the highways industry can plan effective winter maintenance during the pandemic is to take place on September 16th.
Organised by the UK User Group for highways and transport technology and information specialist, Vaisala, which made up of UK local authorities and suppliers and hosted by the Local Council Roads Innovation Group (LCRIG), the webinar will look at what planning and changes need to be implemented to manage winter effectively with COVID in mind.
It will feature sessions on how local authorities and their private sector partners are approaching planning for this winter considering both social distancing and the possibility of a second wave and another lockdown whether localised or not. It will explore the possible weather predictions for this winter and delegates will hear from Steve Berry, Head of Highways at the Department of Transport (DfT) as well as from local authorities on their approach to planning for winter with COVID in mind. Highways England will present a session on Pandemic Preparedness – maintaining safe winter delivery resilience.
It will also include a presentation delivered by Falkirk Council on work done in Scotland by the Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland (SCOTS) based around a recent COVID Impact Survey. The sessions will be chaired by Highways News’ Adrian Tatum.
Peter Turland, Chair of the Vaisala User Group said: “This is a unique insight, debate and discussion into how the winter maintenance community in the UK plan for winter with the impact of COVID in mind and how it may be necessitating change in that planning.
“I am sure you will all have been more than involved with work other than just your own over the recent months, and working differently. With the cancellation of many events, and not being able to plan for others, the Vaisala User Group have decided to have a virtual user group meeting. In a change from our normal user group meeting we have decided to open the meeting up to all and hopefully have some useful discussion on thoughts and plans for the forthcoming winter in the light of the current ‘pandemic’ and how it may be necessitating change in our winter planning.
The webinar is open to User Group members and non user group members as well and you can register at: https://charlottebromley.clickmeeting.com/the-vaisala-user-group-online-round-table-debate/register.
