 I live at the top of a reasonably steep hill and last winter my car was the only one to make it in to its own drive way. I spent many a day whilst I was off towing others up the hill who had foolishly ventured out. One vehicle did have snow chains fitted and he did make it most of the way up.
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Check out Quick Fit. They claim you can put your ordinary tyres in a tyre 'hotel' over the winter and they'll look after them. They say it's common European practice. So Quick Fit provide the storage space for you! I haven't gone into the detail of it yet because I'm waiting until my car is serviced before I see if I can afford snow tyres.
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correct it's totaly normal here in my country that tyre change companies offer tyre hotel possibilities to keep summer and winter tyres. offers are mostly including changing the tyres.
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Volvo are doing the same I have heard They will store them and re fit them as required for about 140 quid
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 Here in Denmark, I routinely put on wheels with winter tyres in November and change to summer tyres at the end of March. If you are in an accident in winter with summer tyres on, you are held liable, regardless aóf any other circumstances. It is illegal in most Europen countries to drive in winter with summer tyres, so if you're thinking of driving to the Alps in winter, you must have winter tyres. On the other hand, studded tyres are illegal in many countries, notable Germany. Studded tyres used to be the norm in Norway and Sweden in winter, but that is no longer the case. Modern winter tyres without studs are now so good that most folk use them, commonly without chains - and on ordinary 2wd cars. The Norwegians plough thir roads, but don't use salt, so the driver needs to be equipped to drive on packed snow and ice. You can drive on ice up some steep hair-pinny Norwegian roads quite staisfactorily in a 2wd car with proper winter tyres without chains. Chains are most of use on new deep snow, to give you traction to pull out of the drifts.
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 Studded tyres are illegal in Alpine Italy too. Chains are obligatory aboard from november to march or april (can't remember exactly) or else you need snow tyres. 4WDs need four chains.They check routinely.
I've often wondered why the Brits don't use snow tyres. So convenient especially for the small amounts of now you get in the UK.
I have a 4WD (Not a fashion statement, I need one to get home in the winter). Put summer tyres on it and in winter it's the same or worse than a 2WD. Put snow tyres on and it'll go most places. Put chains or snow socks on and you can go anywhere. But judging by the amount of cretins about with their SUVs people think that 4WD means absolute safety and don't bother to put chains or snow-tyres on. This attitude does help to reduce the population though. Two years ago most of the cars off road in ditches were SUVs and the fatter the tyres like the cherokee and rangerovers the faster they crash.
Most of the hill farmers who live in seriuosly tricky places have 2WD pandas or small compact narrow wheeled cars and go everywhere anyway.
The best car I ever owned was the Panda 4x4 which beats everything except a landrover both narrow wheels and manual selection of 4WD.
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There's a crappy old Disco parked across the road from me with a for sale sign. 1K gets all you need. It has some great tyres for snow and ice. And if you get stuffed by some one you just hit the bent bits with a hammer.
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 Are 'mud' tyres effective in the snow?
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 Yes, very effective. They're a pain on anything hard though, noisy, kicks hell out of the drivetrain and fuel efficiency and they wear out fast. All terrain tyres like Grabber AT2's are a good compromise.
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 Like most things, equipment helps but it's the nutter behind the wheel that really matters. Having trialled landies for many years the significant factors boil down to driver, 4x4 - try getting a landy with a bust half-shaft/diff out of a clay pit, and tyres. 2wheel drive and decent winter/mud tyres will do very well with a driver who understands what they have and can get the best out of them. Which all takes practice. A play on an iced up carpark or closed area is a good way to learn. Michelin used to make tyres, to fit landies, that where called Mud and Snow which were a good compromise. Not as good as Firestone All Terrains which were more like dumper truck tyres and behaved appalingly on normal tarmac. But anything with an open tread that will self-clean when spun will give a lot more traction than road tyres that turn into slicks and stay that way. Solid ice is a different matter and only chains or studs will penetrate the surface to provide some grip.
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 There is also the option of snow socks as an absolute "get me out of trouble" option. The only down side is that they HAVE to be removed as soon as you reach tarmac or they will quickly wear down. They are very easy to slip on and off though and when driving, unlike chains you don't hear or feel them and they do not potentially damage transmission like snow chains do. Probably no good for SERIOUS snow driving, but handy to store in the vehicle as a "rescue" item. Someone has already said it though, much of it is how you drive in the conditions, and not the vehicle. I once had a VW beetle which would get anywhere and one of my colleagues used to use his wife's Citroen Dianne in the snow and I have never seen a vehicle more capable of handling snow!
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 Snow socks did the business for me on last year's OM Winter Skills course, which coincided with the massive snow dump in the Cairngorms at the end of Feb. I'm sure mine (Weiss-socks) say you can drive a certain distance on tarmac (can't remember exactly, and obviously better not to). Two folk bought snow chains on that same trip - both of them had them snap! 
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A 4x4 will beat a 2wd with winter tyres if there is deep snow lying on the road. A friend of mine fitted winter tyres to his Laguna Sport and has had no problem getting around our locale (Perthshire), but did have some concern about ground clearance when he could feel some rubbing yesterday - no point having great grip, if your wheels aren't touching the ground! If the snow has already been compacted, however, winter tyres should be great (as they are in other countries as mentioned). I'm not sure where our snow ploughs have been, but we've not seen much sign of them. My wife was very grateful to be in our Disco going to work at 6:30 yesterday morning, for a 12 hour shift in ITU - she ended up picking up 4 people on the way in who had had to abandon their cars, but ours, on decent tyres, handled, she said, wonderfully. In our hatchback, she would not have got out of our road because of the piles of snow from the previous day, and fresh snowfall overnight.
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Well I've spent the best part of today looking round for snow socks and for snow tyres. The two web-sites I did go into for snow socks don't have any in stock until the 5/12/10 and the 12/12/10 respectively. Regarding snow tyres, Kwik Fit's Marangoni tyres don't get a good review on another web-site I found. HomeTyre Mobile tyre services offered a Matador which also doesn't get a good write-up on the web-site. The HomeTyre sales rep told me there's litle stock out there at the moment because after last year no-one was willing to take the gamble and flood our market with supplies of tyres. So I guess I'll postpone it until I can do some more research. I think space considerations taken into account I'll wait and go for snow socks.
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Having been badly and dangerously had once if you go for tyres forget places like quikfit etc. Go for brand names/reputable companies that only make tyres. Michelin, firestone etc.
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Thanks woozle. I'll beat that in mind. No I was going to correct that but on second thoughts it's about right.
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Well I can't get snow tyres for love nor money. The tyre fitters can't source them as the suppliers/manufacturers say there aren't any. That's likely to have ruined my weekend as we'd planned to go to Derbyshire this weekend. What I saw on Sky News tells me it's under about 4 inches of snow with more to come. Bummer!!  
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 Mazda Bongo 4wd with snow tyres, go anywhere but if you do get stuck brew up in the back.
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Hi Brian, as I have a Mazda I've just received their magazine which featured an article on Bongos their owners and club meets. An eccentric bunch. Each vehicle is unique I understand as Mazda never officially sold them here and they were imported. A 'camper van' with 4wd. I'm almost envious.  Oh yes as a last desperate resort I've now ordered some snow socks for my tyres. They're an alternative to snow chains. If they don't arrive in time, I've asked for courier service, then I don't know if we'll go away this weekend. We'll see.
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