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09
Oct
Council seeks to triple size of Beckwithshaw roundabout to cope with new housing traffic
North Yorkshire Council has applied to build a new roundabout at Beckwithshaw three times the size of the current one, to cope with increased traffic caused by new housing developments in the area.
The Pot Bank roundabout, formerly a T-junction, is where Otley Road meets the edge of the Moor Park estate at Beckwithshaw, and according to the planning application, it is too small.
The council’s planning statement explains why:
The present arrangements are not sufficient to allow the new West of Harrogate developments to come forward without there being significant queues and delays at the present Pot Bank mini roundabout.
The proposed development will enable the roundabout to operate with spare capacity in all its movements, in all scenarios, across both peak hours.
Image: SLR Consulting.
The new roundabout is planned to be 37 metres across, and the extra land required would be taken from a field immediately to the north.
Thirteen trees would need to be removed – some of which arboricultural consultants say are diseased – and would be replaced by 30 saplings of various species, not all of them native.
The roundabout will be jointly funded by the developers of housing schemes in the West of Harrogate.
There are plans, some of them already approved, to build more than 4,000 new homes around Harrogate’s so-called ‘Western Arc’, including some large schemes along Otley Road leading to the Pot Bank roundabout.
More than 4,000 new homes are planned for the west of Harrogate. Credit - HAPARA
The roundabout application looks likely to be approved, not least because other large schemes depend on it.
One housing development awaiting approval, to the south of Cardale Park between Whinney Lane and Beckwith Head Road, is for 480 new homes, but it is understood it cannot go ahead until this new roundabout is built.
According to the planning statement submitted with the roundabout application, North Yorkshire Council has attached a requirement known as a ‘Grampian condition’ to the housing development application preventing it from going ahead until the roundabout has been built and transferred to council control.
The consultation period for the roundabout planning application runs out on Sunday, November 2, and planning officers aim to make a decision on the matter by Thursday, December 4.
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