A cycling group has warned that one of the new options being considered to promote active travel in Harrogate could create a ‘murder strip’ for cyclists.

Cyclists describe unprotected cycle lanes on busy roads as murder strips — and there are fears one could be created on Beech Grove.

North Yorkshire County Council has put forward three options as part of its latest consultation on increasing cycling and walking in Harrogate on Otley Road and the nearby area.

Harrogate District Cycle Action has said the second option is so dangerous it shouldn’t even be offered.

It would involve making traffic one-way on Beech Grove heading out of town and creating an unprotected cycle lane on the opposite side.

Image by Harrogate District Cycle Action

Harrogate District Cycle Action’s submission to the consultation says there isn’t enough width for parking, a traffic lane, and a contraflow cycle lane.

It says the contraflow cycle lane “would be a narrow ‘murder-strip’ in the gutter, very likely 1m 30 wide at the most – i.e. less than the absolute minimum width”. It adds:

“Oncoming traffic would be less likely to slow down to pass, as drivers would think ‘I’m in my lane, the cyclist is in theirs, so I’ll keep going at full speed.’

“That would lead to unpleasant experiences with oncoming vehicles that would feel – and be – dangerous.”

The group is critical of the decision to even consult on the idea.

“Option 2 is nonsense, and should not be presented as an option at all in this consultation. It provides zero benefit to active travel – indeed, it may make matters worse.”

Asked to comment on the cycling group’s concerns, a council spokeswoman said:

“This is a live consultation so we can’t comment. All feedback will be considered when it closes. “

Beech Grove has reopened to through traffic after an 18-month closure.

The three options

Option 1 – The existing proposal on Otley Road 

The first option is what was originally proposed for this phase of the Otley Road cycle path which runs between the junctions of Cold Bath Road and Beech Grove.

These plans include junction upgrades and shared cycle paths and footways, similar to what has already been built on Otley Road. But the county council said some sections could be too narrow, which is why it is considering re-routing.

Harrogate District Cycle Action supports this option.

Option 2 – An alternative route using Victoria Road

Under these plans the route would be diverted onto Victoria Road with a one-way traffic system and the removal of some parking spaces to allow for a 1.5 metre wide cycle path.

The one-way traffic system would run up until Lancaster Road, before connecting with Beech Grove.

Option 3 – An alternative route using Queens Road

This final option would see a 3m wide shared cycle path and footway built on Queens Road before connecting with Lancaster Road and Beech Grove.

Parallel and toucan crossings are also proposed.

A 15-year-old girl has been sentenced to a 12-month referral order for her role in an attack on two police officers in broad daylight in Harrogate.

The incident took place in McDonald’s on Cambridge Road at around 5pm on April 1 this year.

The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to five charges. They included two counts of assaulting police community support officers, causing both actual bodily harm and one of affray, using or threatening violence which led people to fear for their safety, all in the fast food restaurant.

She also admitted a further charge of assaulting a police officer by beating her in Valley Gardens, and one of failing to comply with an exclusion order to leave McDonald’s.

North Yorkshire Youth Court, sitting at Harrogate Justice Centre, heard today that the teenager had been in McDonald’s with friends at about 5pm when there was confusion over whether or not they were banned from the premises. Police officers were called and the girls were found in the upstairs toilets.

In trying to remove them from the building, the officers came under attack.

‘Tussle’

Prosecuting, Melanie Ibbotson said:

“The PCSO goes to grab [another teenage girl] to stop her going back into the toilets and as she does so, there’s a tussle between them both.

“She was trying to grab hold of her, they were pushing and pulling each other, moving towards the top of the stairs, and at this point [the officer] activates her alarm.”

Ms Ibbotson said the 15-year-old then went to help her friend, but in trying to prevent herself being pushed down the stairs, the PCSO grabbed her hair.

The court was shown video evidence of the attack in which the PCSO was punched on the nose, causing heavy bleeding, and her colleague was hit around the face, injuring her jaw and cheek.

The teenagers then left the building and were found in Valley Gardens by other police officers. The 15-year-old spat at a police constable as she was arrested.

The PCSOs were taken to hospital. Neither suffered broken bones, but the PCSO with the injured nose required several months of treatment and could still face an operation to repair the damage inflicted on her in the attack.

The other PCSO had since left the police, the court heard, in part because of the incident in McDonald’s.

Read more:

• Teenagers charged after PCSOs allegedly assaulted in Harrogate McDonald’s
• Two PCSOs seriously injured after attack in Harrogate McDonald’s

Defending, Andrew Tinning of Grahame Stowe Bateson, told the court the teenager had never been in trouble with the police before and the incident had “come out of the blue”.

He said she had been working voluntarily with the youth offending team in the months since, in order to improve her behaviour. He said:

“When she was interviewed, she admitted what she had done, she apologised for her actions, she said she did have an anger issue and she had set out to protect her friend, as she saw it.

“It was a complete over-reaction to the situation she was faced with, but that’s what she did.”

Mother ‘shellshocked’

Her mother told the court she was “shellshocked” when she heard what her daughter had done, adding:

“She made the wrong friends and wrong choices and it just escalated from there.”

Mr Tinning said the girl had since been permanently excluded from school but was about to start at a new school where she could take her GCSEs. She was “academically gifted”, he said, and already had plans for the next steps in her career, supported by her mother.

She now had a part-time job and was at home every evening, the court heard, and had stopped associating with some of her previous friends.

The girls appeared at North Yorkshire Youth Court today

After magistrates retired to consider their sentence, bench chairman Alison Henny told the teenager they had seriously considered a term in a young offenders’ institute because of the severity of the attacks.

However, because of her age and her willingness to improve her behaviour, they had decided to give her a 12-month youth referral order during which she would be given support to make better choices and control her anger.

Mrs Henny said:

“The aim of the youth court is rehabilitation. We believe there’s a real prospect of you being rehabilitated.”

The magistrates ordered her mother to pay compensation of £100 for each of the injured PCSOs.

Meanwhile, a 14-year-old girl, also from Harrogate, has pleaded not guilty to assaulting an emergency worker by beating her, affray, and failing to comply with an exclusion order, at McDonald’s on the same date.

She is due to appear for trial at North Yorkshire Youth Court on November 25.

Another 14-year-old girl has already been dealt with by an out-of-court disposal through the youth outcomes panel in relation to the same incident.

A transport leader has branded the performance of trains by the Harrogate line operator as “dire”.

Lord McLoughlin, chair of Transport for the North, today called on the government to urgently intervene to help end the current “unacceptable” levels of performance on the rail network in the north of England.

His comments come after new figures showed more than a third of Northern trains fail to run on time. Northern operates the Harrogate and Knaresborough line between Leeds and York.

In mid-summer, only 62% of Northern trains arrived on time. The figure increased marginally to 64% for the period from August 21 to September 17.

A press release by Transport for the North, which is a partnership of public and private sector representatives campaigning for better transport infrastructure in northern England, said services by Northern and other rail operators in the north “have been of a poor quality for far too long now”.

Lord McLoughlin, chair of Transport for the North, said:

“The current situation on the north’s rail network is simply unacceptable.

“It’s completely inexcusable that communities in the north of England are having to experience such a dire level of service. It requires an urgent intervention as it’s undermining businesses and holding back economic growth.”

He added “far too many trains” were being cancelled and “too many are cancelled at short notice causing chaos for commuters and local communities”.

Read more:

• Rail strikes to cause six days of Harrogate district disruption
• Boy, 16, caught with 110 wraps of heroin and cocaine in Harrogate’s Library Gardens

Lord McLoughlin, who is a Conservative peer, added:

“We want to see the operators given the freedom to negotiate a solution to Rest Day Working by themselves, and for a rail academy for the north to be fast-tracked, and for current devolved structures, such as the Rail North Partnership Board, to be strengthened and play a bigger role working with our partners across the north.”

The Stray Ferret asked Northern if it wanted to respond to Lord McLoughlin’s comments but we did not receive a response.

Harrogate’s Rachel Daly was among the winners at this week’s Pride of Britain awards.

Daly was part of the England women’s football team that beat Germany 2-1 in the final of Euro 2022 this year.

At a ceremony hosted by Ashley Banjo and Carol Vorderman, the team received a special award for inspiring girls to play football.

Pic: Rachel Daly Instagram

The ceremony was held at London’s Grosvenor House on Monday and broadcast on ITV last night.

The Daily Mirror’s Pride of Britain recognise extraordinary achievements by ordinary people.

It was the latest success of a remarkable year for Aston Villa striker Daly, who was named Women’s Super League player of month in September.

Read more:

• Rachel Daly wins Women’s Super League player of the month award
• Harrogate’s Rachel Daly scores twice on dream return to England

The winter lights decorating trees around Harrogate’s Stray have had something of a makeover.

New LED bulbs have replaced the older ones and the strings of lights are no longer hanging from branches as they have done in the past.

Contracts manager for Harrogate-based Yorkshire Lighting Services, Rob Malloy, explained:

“The council couldn’t carry on with the trees lights how they were as any storm damage would wreck them. The lights were strung up from branch to branch.

“It’s been designed to reduce breakage. We’ve wrapped them around the trunks and branches. Each tree is different – each is unique.

“The idea is to cheer people up.”

The company won the tender to replace the lights and has had four workers on the project for the past couple of months.

Forty trees around the Stray, West Park and York Place have all seen the old lights removed and the new ones put in place.

The council also funded the replacement of lights on the trees on Otley Road and Leeds Road that had been individually sponsored in memory of loved ones in aid of Yorkshire Cancer Research around a decade ago.

Mr Malloy told the Stray Ferret that he hoped the result would be a fitting memory for those people the trees lights have been dedicated to.

Top Harrogate Tree Lights Facts: 

• Each tree is wrapped with 100 metres of cable
• There are 1,000 LED bulbs per tree
• They are connected to the street lights for power
• Each tree uses 30 watts of energy
• The LED bulbs are brighter than the previous ones and will last longer
• They’re switched on by photocell system that’s directed by daylight
• They switch off at midnight

Councillor Sam Gibbs, Harrogate Borough Council’s cabinet member for environment, waste reduction and recycling, said:

“The Stray is such an iconic landmark for Harrogate and throughout the year attracts thousands of visitors.

“We’re often complimented on the existing lighting, but it can be difficult to manage due to lights getting blown around, hanging down and becoming dangerous.

“The replacement project will be a big change compared to the current display and should continue to bring a smile to people’s faces as they travel through the town in the evening.”

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A man from Bradford has been jailed for 30 months after pleading guilty to supplying Class A drugs in Harrogate’s Library Gardens.

Shaoib Shafiq, 20, and a 16-year-old boy who cannot be named for legal reasons, were stopped on September 26, 2020, after reports of drug dealing.

The 16-year-old had 110 wraps of heroin and crack cocaine hidden in his underwear and Shafiq had a Nokia burner-style mobile phone with a pre-pay SIM card that was used as the drugs line.

The pair were sentenced at York Crown Court on Wednesday.

Shafiq was jailed for 30 months and the boy was handed a community order, unpaid work and a rehabilitation requirement.

Shafiq and the teenager travelled to Harrogate from Bradford together and were in regular contact several days before their arrest.

Read more:

• Knaresborough man jailed for ‘punishment beating’ of ex-partner
• Prolific Harrogate criminal jailed after hospital rampage

PC Chris Dyson said:

“Drug dealing has a hugely damaging effect on communities and destroys lives.

“These two individuals thought they could come into North Yorkshire and deal Class A drugs, but we showed them different.

“We work hard to target those who insist on bringing misery to communities and we will not stop making sure those who commit this type of crime are brought to the courts.”

Here is this morning’s update on traffic and travel across the Harrogate district.

Spotted anything else? Email us the details and we’ll add it below to help others get around this morning.

Harrogate

The long-term gas works on Crescent Road In Harrogate town centre are due to be paused this week.

Motorists are still unable to turn left at the Parliament Street junction and traffic coming the opposite way on Ripon Road is unable to turn right but by next week the restrictions should have ended.

Roadworks near the Harrogate Town ground on Wetherby Road in Harrogate are due to end today.

According to North Yorkshire County Council’s roadworks map, two sets of traffic lights will be active on Skipton Road, between the Empress roundabout and King’s Road.

The top of Woodfield Road is also closed to traffic leaving Skipton Road, though open to vehicles leaving Woodfield onto Skipton Road. Those works are scheduled to end today.

Kingsley Drive remains closed between Birstwith Road and Rydal Road until November 6. There are also temporary traffic lights on Kingsley Road while work continues to create an access road to the new housing development.

Knaresborough

Traffic lights on the A59 York Road near the junction with the A658 in Knaresborough are due to remain in place until November 11.

Yorkshire Water has installed four-way traffic lights as it lays a new water main for a housing development.

Kirkgate Road in central Knaresborough is closed today for works to the kerbs.

Several sets of two-way traffic lights are in place along the A6055 Boroughbridge Road between Knaresborough and Minskip.

Branton Lane in Great Ouseburn is closed until next Friday while Yorkshire Water lays a new main.

Ripon and Nidderdale

In Ripon, roadworks are due to conclude on Heckler Lane and New Road today.

Stumps Lane in Darley is closed for another week for a sewer to be connected.

Work to reconstruct the landslip-hit B6265 at Red Brae Bank, Bewerley, near Pateley Bridge, is ongoing.

The road is closed and a diversion is in place via Pateley Bridge, the B6451 Dacre, Menwith Hill Road, Duck Street and Greenhow Hill village. Temporary traffic lights will be in place during the remainder of the work.

Fell Beck Bridge remains closed for works until November 6, with a diversion in place via Burnt Yates and Summerbridge.

Trains and buses

Rail operator Northern is not reporting any significant problems on the line passing through Harrogate and Knaresborough this morning but the live departure and arrival board for Harrogate shows the 7.09am Northern service to York is currently running seven minutes late.

The Harrogate Bus Company is not currently reporting any cancellations or significant delays on its services.  You can get updates here.

An early warning for you: there are some changes to bus timetables on the horizon, taking effect from Sunday, November 6. Most of these are minor, but in a more significant change, the 36 will no longer offer ‘neighbourhood journeys’ from Bilton and Jennyfield to Leeds.

The bus company said this is down to low passenger numbers. Passengers can still get tickets through to Leeds if they start their journeys on the 2A, 2B or 3.

Check the full details on the Harrogate Bus Company website.

Read more:

• Harrogate roadworks ‘paused’ until New Year
• Roadworks lead to long queues on A59 near Knaresborough

North Yorkshire County Council has said it will consider “alternative educational uses” for Woodfield Community Primary School‘s buildings after it closes.

Councillors confirmed this week the 56-year-old Bilton school will close on December 31.

The council claims it has “exhausted all options” to keep the school open after years of falling pupil numbers and an inadequate rating by Ofsted.

But the move has angered local families who do not understand why the school, in a densely populated area of Harrogate, needs to close.

Following this week’s decision, the Stray Ferret asked the council about the future of the site, which includes substantial playing fields as well as the school building.

We asked what discussions have taken place about the use of the school site, what the options are and what the timescale for a decision is likely to be. We also asked whether the council had ruled out using the site for housing.

Read more:

• ‘Badly let down’ Woodfield school closure confirmed\
• Starbeck and Bilton community libraries set for 10-year council deal

The council replied in a statement:

“No discussions have taken place on the future use of the site, ahead of a decision being made on the school’s future this week.

“The site is owned by the county council and also houses Bilton and Woodfield Community Library, Harrogate Bilton Children and Family Hub and Oak Beck House. All of these services remain open and unaffected by the school closure.

“The county council will be exploring whether there are alternative educational uses for the school buildings. There are controls around the reuse or redevelopment of school sites, and any alternative uses that are proposed will be the subject of consultation.”

No further details have been released.

A housing developer has said it “doesn’t anticipate” a controversial road closure in the Kingsley area of Harrogate will last six months.

The Stray Ferret reported yesterday that pedestrians, dog walkers and cyclists face a 1.4-mile detour when Kingsley Road is completely sealed off beyond the junction with Kingsley Drive up to the bridge leading to Bogs Lane.

The affected route is popular among people looking to access the shared cycle route and footpath to Bilton.

North Yorkshire County Council issued a temporary prohibition of traffic order, from November 7, lasting for up to 12 months, to enable Redrow to carry out work at its 133-home Kingsley Manor development.

David Faraday, technical director for Redrow (Yorkshire), said:

“The road closure will be in place while works to create a new junction, access road and associated services for the development are completed. This includes extensive excavation works to connect the sewers and installation of a new three-way traffic light system.

“We don’t anticipate the works will take the full six months to complete and the closure allows for a period of contingency.”

Hundreds of homes are being built in the Kingsley area.

Chris Aldred, a Liberal Democrat who represents High Harrogate and Kingsley on North Yorkshire County Council, said yesterday he planned to ask Redrow if access for walkers and cyclists could be maintained for some periods while work is carried out.

Asked if this was something Redrow would consider, Mr Faraday responded:

“The road will be closed to ensure the safety of local residents and we apologise in advance for any inconvenience they may experience over the coming months.

“If it is possible to create a safe through route for pedestrians temporarily while more minor works are underway we will endeavour to do so, but a full closure will be in place while all major works are undertaken, as advised by our contractor.”

Read more:

• Harrogate road closure means 1.4-mile detour for walkers and cyclists
• Harrogate council says it can’t take action on complaints of ‘poisonous’ construction dust in Kingsley area

Asked what consultation had been carried out, he said:

“We notified local residents of the works and road closure via letter on October 19. Formal notification of road closures is the statutory responsibility of the local authority.”

An artist’s impression of how the Redrow development will look.

Mr Faraday said the two, three and four-bedroom homes would “provide a huge boost to local housing supply for a wide market” and the development “will be characterised by areas of natural green space, mature trees and varied planting, and will also feature two play areas”.

He added:

“We are making significant contributions to the local community as part of the planning agreement, including more than £540,000 towards local education, £190,000 towards open space provision, £44,600 towards traffic signals and £5,000 for a local travel plan.”

Rainbows have designed a Stop, Look and Listen banner to display on the gates of Saltergate School.

It was one of a series of activities undertaken by members of 5th Harrogate Rainbows to help them learn about road safety.

As part of the initiative, Lauren Doherty, who lives in Knaresborough and uses her own experience of a traffic accident to educate people about road safety, gave a talk to the group.

The banner was the Rainbows’ final assignment and will encourage others to take road safety more seriously.

Samantha Suttle, leader of 5th Harrogate Rainbows, said”

“We hope this will help all children and adults stay safe when crossing the road. Well done Rainbows!”

Read more:

• Pannal Ash residents call for 20mph zone for four schools
• ‘Badly let down’ Woodfield school closure confirmed