Pay attention! Very slippery roads in Ghent, masses of cyclists falling, tram traffic disrupted and 100 reports to the police | Ghent

The Ghent gritters nevertheless drove out last night to provide everything in and around Ghent with a layer of salt. Apparently in vain, because this morning the roads in Ghent were very slippery. Before 9 a.m., the police received more than a hundred calls about slipperiness, including reports of fallen cyclists, pedestrians, but also accidents involving cars. It is so busy that the police only come to the scene of accidents involving others, or where there are injuries. At the Verlorenkost, for example, it is so slippery that every cyclist hits the deck. People are now stopping cyclists there themselves. The same is happening at the Bargie Bridge.

The emergency services of Ghent hospitals are currently running at full speed. Before 9 a.m., several cyclists and moped riders had already been brought in with fractures and abrasions at both UZ Gent and AZ Sint-Lucas. The Fietsersbond reports that it has been a long time since it saw so many ambulances on the road in Ghent center. Reports of angry citizens and misunderstanding about the slippery roads in Ghent are also pouring in on Twitter.

It was complete chaos on the entrance and exit to Ghent centre, the B401. At least five accidents happened there, and everything was fixed during the morning rush hour. The tow truck didn’t make it through. In the meantime, the situation there has normalized. De Lijn was also affected. Many overhead lines of the tram network were frozen, so the trams could not run. This was the case, among others, between UZ Gent, Gent-Sint-Pieters and Zwijnaarde. That problem was not resolved until around 9.45 am.

“Ghent has indeed been sprinkled,” says mobility alderman Filip Watteeuw (Groen). “Thursday evening at 8 p.m. the gritters left. But it rained afterwards, which washed away some of the salt, and then you get this. Moreover, sprinkling for cyclists has less effect than sprinkling for cars anyway, because the effect of the salt is promoted by the pressure of the passing vehicles. But this kind of weather – half wet, half frost and rain on top – is the hardest slipperiness to fight, snow is much easier to deal with. We then started a new spreading round this morning, but it takes four to six hours to pass on all roads.”