Editor's Pick of the Week: Junk food, Ripon ghost trains and a new Stray Ferret office

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Where’s the best place to live in the Harrogate district? The Sunday Times reckoned this week it was Ripon.

It’s a fair shout, but how did the newspaper come to this conclusion — did it praise Spa Gardens, the cathedral or nearby Fountains Abbey? Nope, but it did say, “you’re a stone’s throw from fast road and rail communications and stunning countryside”.

Eh? Trains haven’t run in Ripon since the 1960s. A southern mate likes the city so much he wants to move to it but the lack of trains is holding him back. A case of right conclusion, wrong logic, maybe.

There was bedlam on one of those fast roads near Ripon — the Dishforth bypass — when a pony and trap race had vehicles scattering on to the verges last weekend.

Apparently, it’s perfectly legal for horses and carts to race on roads, and the Dishforth bypass is as popular for this activity as the streets of Monaco are for grand prix racing.

How do you feel about council leisure centres and hospitals selling junk food in vending machines? 

Our taxes fund these places, which are ostensibly about health and wellbeing — something that seems at odds with selling items such as Quavers, Mini Cheddars and Diet Coke.

We sent freedom of information requests to North Yorkshire Council and Harrogate hospital to find out what they stock and why. This week we published the results here and here.

Health charities called for a rethink but the council and hospital said the products comply with the requirements of a national framework. So that's alright then. 

I started Monday at the reopening of Fodder at the Great Yorkshire Showground and ended it attending Knaresborough Town Council. The council chamber, which admittedly isn’t that big, was unusually full as so many members of the public had come to hear about the campaign to save the town’s market. You can read what happened here and here.

Finally, Monday also marked our first day in the new Stray Ferret office on James Street in Harrogate. We could hardly be more at the heart of things. Do send us your news and, if you need help subscribing — which you can do here — call in and see us.