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05
Dec 2021
Last Updated: 03/12/2021
Stray Views: Station Gateway will benefit far more people than cyclists
Harrogate Station Gateway continues to provoke strong views: Malcolm Margolis says the town needs to wake up to the wider benefits of the scheme while two other readers provide alternative views.
Letters
Stray Views is a weekly column giving you the chance to have your say on issues affecting the Harrogate district. It is an opinion column and does not reflect the views of the Stray Ferret. Send your views to letters@thestrayferret.co.uk.
Station Gateway will benefit far more people than cyclists
It’s good to read letters in Stray Views from Andrew Willoughby, Peter Whittingham and others in favour of the Station Gateway project, countering what in my opinion are unfounded fears about a great opportunity for significant investment to improve the town centre.
The Station Gateway scheme is not ‘to benefit cyclists’. The suggestion by some that the only way into town will be on a bicycle is utter nonsense. The scheme is aimed at ‘improving the public realm’, making the town centre a better place for people to spend time in, and to make it a safer and more pleasant place in which to walk and cycle.
It will mean less traffic, which scientists and governments recognise is essential if we are serious about tackling the climate crisis.
Objectors claim, with great confidence but no evidence, that reducing Station Parade to one lane is sure to cause massive congestion. I don’t agree. I think the conclusion of the county council’s consultants, based on pre-covid data, makes sense, which is that journey times will only be marginally longer even at peak times. What we are more likely to get is traffic evaporation. As this 2019 study found, 'one of the best kept, and counter intuitive secrets in urban planning [is that] less road space doesn’t increase congestion but leads to a drop in vehicle numbers'.
This is what appears to be happening in the centre of Leeds where a far more radical reallocation of road space than is planned for Harrogate is well underway.
I ran Argos Sports in Beulah Street for 30 years. I believe that the noisy minority of local businesses opposing the scheme don’t know what’s good for them.
They are being offered a £10.9m investment to improve and bring more residents and visitors into the town centre yet they keep their heads firmly buried in the past pretending that their customers must be able to park outside their shops, which they can rarely do even now. Station Gateway will make the town centre more successful, and a much less polluted and more pleasant environment in which to spend time and to go to work.
I fully agree with those who want a feasibility study to look at making West Park and Parliament Street two-way, and with making 20mph rather than 30mph the default speed limit in our town centre and elsewhere.
The local authorities are contributing massively to our traffic problem by allowing one development after another, thousands of new homes, to be built which are car dependent by design, too far from town to walk, poorly served by public transport, and with no useful cycle infrastructure.
I also believe it’s time to stop HGVs from using many of our urban streets without restriction day and night.
Malcolm Margolis BEM, Harrogate
Read more:
- 'Station Gateway consultation a whitewash', claim Harrogate petitioners
- Christmas Events: diary of festivities in the Harrogate district
Businesses are right to be worried about Station Gateway
According to North Yorkshire County Council, the outcome of its congestion study was to provide more sustainable transport. It would appear its meaning of sustainable is walking and cycling.
In my view it means frequent, affordable, viable all year transport for all and not just a minority. A total of 22% of the population is over the age of 65.
Have they forgotten the additional congestion and stop-starting which will arise if Station Parade is reduced to one lane? It is a classified major trunk road.
North Yorkshire County Council obviously considered 12 weeks in normal circumstances was required for consultation on the relief road but four weeks during lockdown when residents were advised to stay at home sufficient for the Gateway project.
I understand the Gateway scheme, if it goes ahead ,will start in spring 2022 and take 12 months. North Yorkshire County Council also intend to replace Oak Beck bridge on Skipton Road, with the disruption lasting six months, starting January 2022
It is not surprising that many businesses are concerned about their future.
Catherine Alderson, Harrogate
Gateway is ill-conceived and needs scrapping
I wish to add weight to the growing number of Harrogate residents who oppose the proposed Station Gateway. The project is ill-conceived and in my opinion [and the opinion of everyone in my neighbourhood], it needs to be scrapped.
Roger Cooke, Harrogate
Do you have an opinion on the Harrogate district? Email us at letters@thestrayferret.co.uk. Please include your name and approximate location details. Limit your letters to 350 words. We reserve the right to edit letters.
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