The mayor of Merritt says her council is pleased with communication from the company newly in charge of maintaining the Coquihalla.

Linda Brown says Yellowhead Road and Bridge has semi-annual meetings with people who work the highway – including plow drivers, fire and ambulance crews and even Highway Thru Hell film crews.

“They did have one meeting that I didn’t manage to attend but my deputy (mayor) did, and he was quite pleased with what he was seeing at that meeting. It sounds as if they know what they want to do, they’re on top of these issues. All I can say is I wish them the best at this point in time. Hopefully we get as good as is expected for the highway.”

Brown says speed is one of the biggest issues during winter on the Coquihalla.

“People just don’t slow down, and when the roads are bad, you can’t drive at 120 kilometres per hour. So it’s a matter of drivers getting used to just slowing down when the road is not as great as it should be, or could be. And it’s usually due to weather, not usually due to maintenance issues.”

Last week, record amounts of snow fell on the Coquihalla Summit in a 24-hour period, as well as the Allison Pass.