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138
Salting Snow.—In continuation of this subject from last, year's report,
according to a report to the Lambeth Borough Council by Mr. II. J. Smith,
the Town Clerk, in October last, the following twelve British cities do not
use salt to assist the removal of the snow from the carriage-ways:—Aberdeen,
Bradford, Bristol, Dundee, Greenock, Inverness, Leeds, Leicester, Leith,
Newcastle, Norwich, Paisley. At Greenock the snow is carted away immediately.
At Dundee it is carted and deposited in the river or sewers or
on vacant ground, and a mixture of salt and sand is used in the main
thoroughfares to prevent horses from slipping during frosty weather. The
use of salt in Inverness is forbidden undar a penalty by the Burgh Police Act,
1892. Salt is used on the carriage-ways in Birmingham, Edinburgh,
Glasgow, Hull, Liverpool, Manchester, Nottingham, and Sheffield.
The following Continental cities do not use salt for the purpose of getting
rid of a snowfall:—Berlin, Berne, Breslau, Christiania, Cologne, Copenhagen,
Frankfurt, Ilamburg, and Munich, whilst Dresden only does so in
exceptional cases. Snow ploughs are employed at Breslau, Cologne, Dresden,
and Frankfurt. The cities where salt is used are Amsterdam, Antwerp, The
Hague, Leipzig, and Paris; the streets of Paris are grouped in three classes
of "urgency," and the salt is spread thereon in order of class.
I11 regard to footpaths, Edinburgh is the only British city where salt is
used to any great extent for the removal of snow. At Hull it is employed
for this purpose, but only to expedite matters when the snow is already
thawing. It is used on the footpaths at Liverpool during the night only, the
slush being flushed away by 8 a.m. It is also used occasionally at Dundee
and Greenock, but with these exceptions none of the British cities use salt on
the footways.
In Continental cities salt is used sparingly on the footpaths at Dresden, The
Hague, and Leipzig, but not at all in the remaining cities. At Breslau and
Paris the inhabitants are required to clear the pavements; at the former
place salt is forbidden, and at the latter it is required that sand, ashes, or slag
should be spread.
In the case of ten British cities — Aberdeen, Bradford, Bristol, Greenock,
Inverness, Leeds, Leicester, Newcastle, Nottingham, and Paisley—the opinion
is that a general use of salt for the removal of snow is objectionable from the
point of view of public health. In the majority of these ten cases the cold
slush that is formed is regarded as being at least unpleasant for, if not
dangerous to pedestrians, and as distinctly injurious to the feet of animals.
At Edinburgh and Hull the medical officers are strongly of opinion that the
use of salt is objectionable; the city engineers, on the other hand, are in
favour of its application. At Hull the city engineer's opinion is that without
applying salt it is impossible to maintain traffic on wood-paving. The city
road surveyor of Edinburgh considers that salt does no appreciable injury to
paved roads, but tends to break the surface of macadamised roads. The
medical officers of Dundee, Liverpool, and Manchester consider that no actual
harm results from the method of applying the salt in their respective cities,
though in the case of Manchester it is stated that, no doubt, people with
defective boots suffer severely.