IT was Gridlock Day as snow brought chaos to Huddersfield.

Motorways were jammed and main roads were closed for several hours despite Kirklees Councils best efforts in gritting 60% of the network.

As the morning rush-hour crawled by, lorries snarled up and vehicles broke down, blocking paths and forcing motorists to endure long delays.

Many people stayed at home for the day with roads blocked by several inches of snow.

Kirklees Council closed several roads around Huddersfield including the A6024 Holme Moss, A629 Penistone Road, A635 Greenfield Road, Holmfirth and A640 New Hey Road.

The M62, which is the responsibility of the Highways Agency, was also badly disrupted but did stay open.

At one point, police reported 13-mile tailbacks on the Pennine stretch above Huddersfield with two of the lanes closed because of blizzard conditions.

Kirklees Councils head of highways Mark Dobson told the Examiner: Policy is that we grit priority routes, which is 60% of the network. Once we have done this we move on to the rest of the network.

We have had continuous snow throughout the rush-hour period and beyond which has forced more traffic on to main routes.

Asked if they had done enough he replied: The difficulty is we rely on the Met Office predictions.

It may have been in some areas that there has been wash-off due to heavy rain.

He said night patrols were out on the tops and at the first sight of snow at 3.45am in North Kirklees, the information was filtered back to the fleet to get them back on the road.

Teams were also out in Huddersfield town centre and Dewsbury town centre gritting roads and pavements by hand.

One of numerous hold-ups was in Halifax Road in Huddersfield as traffic queued back to the motorway at Ainley Top.

In Lindley Moor Road, a lorry slipped on a slight hill near the Wappy Springs pub and blocked the road, causing police to divert traffic to surrounding routes.

Motorists on the M62 eastbound were held up for more than an hour after two vehicles broke down, blocking two lanes between Rishworth Moor (junction 22) and Ainley Top (junction 24).

Traffic on the A62 into Huddersfield also queued following flooding at Cooper Bridge Road.

A lorry jack-knifed between Meltham and Netherton, causing buses and other traffic to be diverted.

Later in the day, the West Yorkshire Police helicopter patrolled the skies above the M62 to monitor traffic conditions as the lanes remained congested between Rishworth Moor and junction 27 at Gildersome.

No serious accidents were reported.

Meanwhile train passengers travelling between Huddersfield and Manchester Victoria were delayed until 10am because of signalling failures between Marsden and Greenfield.

Bus services across the Huddersfield area were also badly disrupted

Buses were gridlocked in Denby Dale for most of the day and services in Highburton, Gomersal and Emley were halted.

A spokesman for Metro, which operates the bus network, reported services were gradually brought back to normal by mid-afternoon yesterday.