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Aug 2024
Councillors to discuss threat to Ripon’s military heritage after petition success
Councillors will discuss the threat to Ripon’s military heritage next month after a petition achieved its target.
Ripon Military Heritage Trust launched a campaign in May, backed by the Stray Ferret, to save a group of army barracks buildings that are due to be removed as part of the 1,300-home Clotherholme development.
The buildings would be re-purposed for community use and used to interpret and commemorate Ripon’s rich military history.
As part of the campaign, the trust and the Stray Ferret organised a petition urging North Yorkshire Council to support the initiative.
The petition more than doubled its target of 500 signatures, which is the threshold required to trigger a debate by the council’s Skipton and Ripon area constituency committee.
The council has confirmed the issue is due to be on the agenda at the committee’s next meeting on September 5 in Skipton.
Although the committee can only make recommendations to the council, which adjudicates on planning applications, it can raise awareness of the issue and increase pressure for action.
The Stray Ferret campaign last year.
Threat remains
Government housing agency Homes England, which submitted the planning application, has failed to give any assurances it will preserve the buildings. Neither has the Ministry of Defence, which owns the land, or the council.
The trust is continuing to engage with all parties and is frustrated by the apparent lack of support for a unique heritage asset.
The barracks buildings that may soon be bulldozed are the last of their kind that could be preserved as a group. In the Second World War they housed the staff of the School of Military Engineering and those who came to Ripon to be trained.
Guy Wilson, chairman of the trust, said the work done in Ripon saved many civilian and military lives and helped shorten the war significantly. He added:
How important is what we’re about to lose in Ripon? Well, if you asked what were Yorkshire’s major contributions to winning the war I would answer: the service and sacrifice of Yorkshire men and women; the Yorkshire industries that built the weapons and equipment we needed; the airfields from which bombers flew to degrade Germany’s ability to fight; and the work of the School of Military Engineering at Ripon.
But other regions of the country can also claim one or more of the first three. Only the last is unique to us here in Yorkshire. Are we to let it go without a fight? That is what we’ll be talking to the local planning committee about. We need a concerted public and political campaign at all levels to put pressure on the stakeholders to show some flexibility and vision and allow some of the buildings to be saved and re-purposed.
We are not objecting to the construction of much-needed new homes, only to the wilful and unnecessary destruction of a unique and very important part of Yorkshire’s heritage.
You can read more about Ripon's important role in two world wars here.
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