Winter viability is complementary to general viability. It aims to maintain the passability of roads during periods of winter weather, applies from November to March and consists of treating snow and ice that may be deposited using mechanical (snow blades) and chemical (salt and brine) means. on the roads. The action of the Department of Doubs, manager of the departmental road network, complements the measures taken by users to equip their vehicles, organize their travel and adapt their driving in the event of a degraded situation.
Maintaining traffic during winter is an important issue, both for economic life and for private travel. Significant human, material and financial resources (on average five million euros per year) are mobilized by the Department of Doubs to provide a service in line with this challenge. Added to this are prevention and road safety awareness campaigns among users of departmental roads (signs along the roads, radio messages, Inforoute25 website, etc.).
The winter service activation periods are unchanged: the intervention period in Haut-Doubs will begin on October 28, 2024 and end on April 7, 2025, while in the plain (Montbéliard and Besançon sectors), it will will extend from November 18, 2024 to March 17, 2025.
In response to climate change, the Department is adapting and evolving its organization
Only the south-eastern fringe of the territory, on the border with Switzerland, is still regularly subject to winter weather phenomena significantly degrading traffic conditions while the north-western limit of the department is now much less exposed and presents similar winter weather conditions. of that of the Mediterranean or Atlantic coastal territories of the 1980s. This results in an increasingly weak activity of the intervention teams (management and private partners) particularly in the plain areas.
A new, more complete and optimized Winter Viability Organization Document (DOVH) version 2024 was therefore developed and voted on by the Departmental Assembly on October 28, 2024. This document makes it possible to better adjust resources to current climatic realities and better inform all stakeholders on the service provided and its limits. Service levels have thus been redefined so as to maintain significant resources on routes supporting significant traffic or with high exposure to weather hazards.
Private companies remain preferred partners even if the optimization of service levels will lead to reduced recourse to the outsourcing of winter maintenance services. Concretely, the reduced use of service providers, particularly private ones in lowland areas, will lead to an extension of the length of managed circuits which will increase to an average of 38 km of departmental roads (compared to 28 km previously). Main and secondary circuits will be put in place to prioritize interventions on the network. This redefinition of the organization between management and private individuals makes it possible to reinforce the role of the Department's teams in the context of winter viability and optimizes the use of the resources available.
The means deployed by the Department of Doubs
The on-duty executives of the Roads, Infrastructure and Transport Department (DRIT) ensure the general coordination of the intervention system in support of the coordinating executives, outside working hours. These members participate in the crisis unit in the Prefecture (Besançon) in the event of activation by the Prefect of the Departmental Operational Center (COD) and relay the information to senior on-call management in real time if the situation so requires. requires. A coordinating executive for winter viability is responsible for interventions at the territorial level of each of the three territorial planning services – STA – spread across the department. Based on the weather conditions, the state of the roads and the possible evolution depending on winter phenomena, these professionals have local responsibility for monitoring the network, triggering the implementation of patrol means, salting interventions. or snow removal as soon as conditions require it. Fifteen coordinating executives thus monitor the network by rotation (on-call) in the three territories of the department (Besançon, Montbéliard and Pontarlier).
Winter service patrollers assist the coordinating executives. They circulate on the network, particularly in sensitive locations, to monitor the evolution of winter phenomena in order to inform coordinating executives and assist them in decision-making, monitoring and control of operations. These are the “eyes” of winter viability.
On board the winter service vehicles, 153 intervention agents ensure the treatment of the network by scraping and/or salting in order to meet the requirements of home-work traffic flows at the start and end of the day. The management alone is responsible for the winter treatment of 51 circuits spread across the entire territory. In addition, around forty private providers ensure the viability of 60 circuits within the framework of public contracts.
The Department of Doubs sets up a specific Media Contact unit during the winter period at the exclusive disposal of the press, in order to transmit in real time direct and objective information on the state of departmental roads and traffic. The Media Contact service is activated if weather conditions require it from Monday to Thursday from 6:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Friday from 6:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. This system can be extended, outside of these hours, in the event of bad weather and exceptional disruptions.
Every morning before 6:30 a.m., the unit's agents carry out a summary of the state of the roads throughout the department based on information collected in the field from coordinating executives and Météo France.
The Department wanted to pool the snow removal of part of its service network with the municipal block. This partnership is formalized by an agreement which defines the operational and financial terms. For winter 2024 2025, there are 16 conventions. Two other agreements have also been signed with the neighboring departments of Haute-Saône and Jura for the pooling of snow removal within departmental boundaries.
The Department has a weather forecast tool under the management of Météo France, making it possible to anticipate weather phenomena in the short and medium term, necessary for good decision-making in terms of winter viability.
Concerning winter service vehicles (ESH), each circuit has at least one dedicated winter service vehicle, with snow removal blade and salt and/or brine spreading system, some of which are equipped with a geolocation device. to have objective data allowing winter maintenance activity to be optimized.
During a moderately harsh winter, it is estimated that around 10,000 tonnes of salt are necessary to treat the 3,690 km of departmental roads.
In addition to the information collected by patrols, the Department has a network of 29 webcams allowing it to monitor the network at strategic points, and to have a real-time view of the state of the roads and weather conditions. The images are made available to the public on the website www.inforoute25.fr.
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