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11
Mar
'Stop this madness,' says anti-Station Gateway campaigner
One of the main opponents of the £12.1 million Harrogate Station Gateway has issued a plea to halt the scheme.
The Stray Ferret reported on Friday that West Yorkshire Combined Authority is expected to approve the full business case for the gateway on Thursday (March 13).
This will pave the way for North Yorkshire Council to begin preparatory work soon before the year-long project gets underway in earnest in September
However, the latest plans for the downgraded scheme have not yet been made public, the cost has risen by almost another £1 million to £12.1 million and an assessment of the scheme has branded it "poor value for money".
This led retired architect Barry Adams, a Harrogate resident and vocal gateway critic, to issue a plea for a rethink.
In a letter to the Stray Ferret, Mr Adams said the "overwhelming opinion" in Harrogate was that the gateway is a "total waste of public money".
He added:
Mr Adams, who said he represented Harrogate Residents Association and Granville Road Residents Group, called instead for more focus on creating a park and ride bus service and a Harrogate bypass.
He accused Cllr Keane Duncan. the council's executive member for highways and Conservative candidate to be North Yorkshire mayor, of "drip feeding" limited information on the gateway to boost his image in the run-up to the mayoral election on May 2.
You can read Mr Adams' letter below.
Cllr Duncan said last week it was an "exciting time for the regeneration" of the town centre. He added:
Read more:
- Work set to begin soon on 'poor value' Harrogate Station Gateway
- Report reveals state of schools in Harrogate and Knaresborough
- Editor's Pick of the Week: Gateway, goals galore at Starbeck and a dental nightmare
Letter by Barry Adams
I was not totally surprised when I read the news in a Stray Ferret article that the West Yorkshire Combined Authority is expected to agree to approve downgraded gateway schemes in Selby and Skipton as well as Harrogate next week.
We have been drip fed very limited written statements on the de-scoped gateway but the actual plans have not been made public. This is totally inadequate to pass constructive comment on.
As we have stated repeatedly and publicly over the last few years the highways executive had and still appears to have a history of ignoring the democratic process, not listening, being dismissive of public comment, hiding behind a meaningless excess of words in press releases.
However, and in the spirit of co-operation and adopting a positive approach a small interested group has tried to arrange a meeting with Cllr Keane Duncan, the executive member for highways, to understand the full implications of the details. We have been waiting for over two months now for him to confirm an actual date.
We believe all the noise from North Yorkshire Council and Keane Duncan is a publicity exercise massaged to justify the project and now to boost the image of Cllr Duncan, the Conservative candidate in the forthcoming elections for Mayor of York and North Yorkshire. It also appears they are desperately scrambling to rescue their reputation with the Department for Transport and possibly other funding bodies.
This must not be allowed to happen at the long term expense of damage to Harrogate but North Yorkshire Council seem inured to criticism. As the article points out, the de-scoped gateway has been branded “poor value for money” in a cost assessment of the scheme. It is an utter total waste of money when councils across the country are desperately trying to make ends meet.
From the extremely limited information we have been fed by North Yorkshire Council, this scheme is more insane than the original, wasting even more money.
It is OUR money — we as taxpayers in one form or another will ultimately pay for it.
The overwhelming opinion in Harrogate is that the gateway project even in its scaled back form is still a total waste of public money especially with the extortionate level of consultants' fees spent to date.
All this appears to put the cart before the horse and we therefore question what opportunity there will be for change if, for example, we are not satisfied with the so called "first class public realm improvements".
What improvements will there be to the appearance of Station Square, if any? What improvements will there be for cycling when we have already suggested a way of achieving this in a joined-up way? What improvements will there be for pedestrians? None.
What improvements will there be to public transport — none apart from the creation of a short length of dedicated bus lane. Still no mention of park and ride. What improvements will there be to reducing congestion, the original purpose of a gateway project — absolutely none.
A re-think on a bypass to remove through traffic from Station Parade is required along with park and ride in the town. The gateway plan achieves absolutely nothing but disruption to the town. We need to get this madness stopped so in the first instance we will once again consider organising an online petition and would ask residents of Harrogate and businesses to give it their full support. We need to strike a chord with people before it is too late.
Barry Adams
On behalf of Harrogate Residents Association and Granville Road Resident’s Group
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