North Yorkshire Council assessed a wall in Knaresborough to be safe three times in the weeks before it collapsed, the Stray Ferret has discovered.

The wall on Briggate crashed on to the highway during the afternoon of September 14. Although it is one of the main routes in Knaresborough, nobody was hurt.

It has now emerged the council had received three complaints about the state of the wall in the weeks leading up to the incident.

The complaints said the wall was crumbling, damaged by weeds and plants and was leaning with mortar fallen out.

Highways officers inspected it on June 5, July 25 and August 10 — just five weeks before it fell. On each occasion they deemed it to be safe.

Here are some photos of the wall taken by the council shortly before it gave way.







The Stray Ferret submitted a freedom of information request to the council on October 18 asking how many members of the public had complained about the wall after Briggate resident Catherine Rogerson told us concerns raised by her and others had been ignored. The response was received yesterday (December 20) — well outside the 20 working days target.

In addition to the complaints by the public, Cllr Hannah Gostlow, a Liberal Democrat who represents Knaresborough East, told the council in June last year the wall “could potentially be a risk to life".  Yet no remedial work was conducted.

The council even undertook a safety report into the state of the wall on September 11, just three days before it caved in.

Based on the findings of a senior engineer and bridge manager, the report — released with redactions following our freedom of information request — assessed all areas of work required to be low or medium priority, except for a leaning seven-metre section.

The report said this section should be taken down and rebuilt as "high priority and should be completed as soon as is reasonably practicable". It added the "wall should be monitored weekly at a minimum to identify any further degradation or change in condition".

Three days water the wall collapsed and the rubble remained on the road for about three months, which caused traffic lights.

Repair work finally began at the end of November and the collapsed section has now been restored and the traffic lights removed. but they are expected to return in January when the rest of the wall undergoes repair.

Read more:

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• Council silent on claims it ignored safety warnings on collapsed Knaresborough wall


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