Rossett Acre Primary School and Oatlands Junior School are to install solar panels on their roofs to generate renewable energy.
Plans were approved by North Yorkshire Council this week to install the technology under permitted development rules, which don’t require full planning applications.
Rossett Acre will see around 120 panels installed with a capacity to generate up to 50.90 kWp of renewable electricity.
Around 48 panels will be installed at Oatlands with a capacity to generate up to 20.40 kWp.
Schools have been particularly affected by the rise in energy bills with the National Education Union warning last year that children’s education could suffer as headteachers face extra cost pressures.
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From April, the government extended its energy support for schools by a further 12 months but it only applies to those paying the highest gas and electricity rates.
Both Oatlands and Rossett Acre are part of the Red Kite Learning Trust. Its estates manager Samantha Shuttleworth wrote in planning documents about both applications:
‘Comprehensive’ road safety improvements announced for Harrogate schools”It is considered that the proposed solar panels would be complementary to the character of the building.
”The visual appearance of the solar panels on the roofed area is considered appropriate for the school building, thereby enhancing the visionary appearance of the site as an up-to-date centre for learning, creating responsible citizens for tomorrow’s world with an appreciation for their surroundings and a duty of care for the environment.
”It is considered that the panels could have a positive impact on the character of the building and no overall detrimental impact on the surrounding area.”
Traffic restrictions, new crossing points and vehicle activated signs are to be introduced to make schools safer in the Harrogate district.
A meeting was held at St Aidan’s Church of England High School yesterday in response to growing concerns about traffic outside schools.
School leaders, councillors, road safety leads from the emergency services and campaigners Hazel Peacock, Dr Vicki Evans and Dr Jenny Marks were among those attending.
Cllr Keane Duncan, North Yorkshire County Council’s Conservative executive member for highways and transport, said afterwards a series of measures would be introduced to “make travelling to school safer, healthier and happier”.
Full details are yet to be revealed but the measures will include Harrogate’s first School Streets pilot at Oatlands Junior School, which will see traffic banned except for residents and emergency vehicles on roads outside the school at busy times during school terms.
Cllr Duncan said:
“Today’s meeting represents a crucial step towards improving road safety and promoting more sustainable journeys for children and families.
“We are working closely with all Pannal Ash and Oatlands area schools, local councillors and residents to make improvements in these busy areas.
“The council has agreed to a comprehensive package of highway improvements to be delivered in the immediate term, including new crossing points, vehicle activated signs and Harrogate’s first School Streets pilot at Oatlands Junior School.
“We are continuing to work on further measures to be delivered in the longer term, including consideration of requests for new 20mph zones.”
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Concern about pupil safety was heightened when two 15-year-old boys from Rossett School were seriously injured outside Ashville College on February 2.
The 20’s Plenty for Us campaign, which wants 20mph to be the default option on residential streets and in town and village centres, has also been calling for change.
Representatives from the following schools attended the meeting: Harrogate Grammar School, St Aidan’s Church of England High School, Rossett School, Western Primary, Rossett Acre Primary, Oatlands Junior School, Oatlands Infant School, St John Fisher’s Catholic High School, Ashville College, Harrogate College and Willow Tree Primary.
Photo-a-day man from Harrogate writes autobiography aged just 30
A young Harrogate man who made international news when he turned 21 has written an autobiography to mark his 30th birthday.
Cory McLeod has led an extraordinary life since he was born, from trekking through South America as an infant with his parents to partying with boxer David Haye in his 20s.
It was a project begun by his dad on the day of his birth that first brought Cory to international attention.
Ian McLeod decided to take a photograph of his son’s face every day for the first year, or perhaps up to the age of two or three. At the time in 1991, he planned to turn into a flick-book – but the project soon grew.
Mr McLeod would send the camera with Cory’s teachers on school trips to ensure he didn’t miss a day, and even travelled for an hour late at night to take a shot when Cory was staying at a friend’s house, before driving home again.
Former Oatlands and St Aidan’s student Cory said:
“It was a family art project for a couple of years, but it became his passion or addiction and he just kept going.
“In his mind, 18 or 21 seemed a good time to stop, but when we got that far, we thought, ‘let’s keep going’.”
In 2012, Cory turned the photos into a video which he uploaded to YouTube, showing his development each day for more than two decades.
It proved a hit: it has since been viewed more than six million times. As a result, Cory and Ian hit the headlines and appeared on TV and radio shows around the world.
In the decade since, his life has been even more eventful.
Moving to Dubai to work in events has brought him into contact with numerous celebrities, from Rihanna to Prince Harry – who, on one memorable night, asked Cory to stop offering him drinks and leave him alone.
A keen traveller, Cory has had many adventures, not all of them trouble-free. He has been held at gunpoint and met bandits during his travels, but always managed to take his daily photograph to keep the project going.
Last month, he published a new video, including images up to his 30th birthday.
His new autobiography, which he began writing during the covid lockdown when he was stuck in his apartment in Dubai, is called 30 Years: A Life Lived Every Day. It covers all his experiences up to the age of 30, in late 2021.
It took him more than two years to complete it, often writing for six or seven hours after work.
The daily photographs, documenting wherever he was in the world, proved a useful prompt in his writing.
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The photos are a kind of social history, from masked selfies during the covid pandemic to the shot of him holding a Blockbuster video from the late 1990s. His favourites are those that show his travels around the world, and special moments in his family life.
Yet taking them has not always been easy, he said.
“I went through a phase where I was constantly remembering at 10 or 11 at night. I’m trying to get out of the habit of doing that.
“Over the course of the whole thing, we’ve only forgotten a handful of times.”
Cory’s autobiography will be published in August and is available to pre-order now.
It is his second book, after he turned his blog about his journey to Everest base camp into a book. He said he now has the writing bug and hopes to use his degree in TV and film production to turn to script writing next.
That drive to create comes from his parents, who were also adventurous: they took him backpacking in South America when he was just one. Dad Ian has since begun a new photo-a-day project, taking him from 60 to the end of his life.
As for the photographs – now selfies taken by Cory wherever he is in the world – he has no intention of stopping. He has his sights set on a lifetime of daily photos.
Family of young heart transplant patient grateful for gift of 28 years“I think it would be amazing – the first time you could see a full life, from birth to death.”
A heart transplant received by a young girl from Harrogate in 1994 opened the door to almost three decades of wonderful experiences for her whole family.
Now, as they mourn Lynda’s death 28 years after the operation, parents Kerry and Brian Morrison are urging everyone to donate organs and share their wishes with their loved ones, in order to give the gift of life to others.
Lynda Morrison was just seven when she fell ill in 1994, shortly after she had moved from Kent to Harrogate with her parents and three sisters.
She was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy caused by a virus and told she would need a heart transplant.
Lynda’s health deteriorated rapidly and she was soon put on the European urgent list for a suitable donor organ.
Two false starts saw the family set out for the transplant unit at Newcastle, only to be told the operation could not go ahead.
Brian said:
“The first time, we turned round at Durham services. The second time we got all the way to the hospital. They radioed ahead and closed the Tyne Tunnel so we could get through.”
Then, in late 1994, Kerry and Brian received a call to say a heart was coming from France and they made the journey by ambulance to the Freeman Hospital.
This time, the operation went ahead successfully. Kerry said:
“We don’t know who gave the heart – just that it came from France. We wrote a letter to the donor’s family and our friend translated it into very good French. We sent it off, but we never got a reply.”
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Once the initial period of checks and treatments was complete, Lynda settled into a routine of three-monthly visits to the Freeman Hospital. Slowly, she returned to a more normal life – with a few unusual features thrown in.
Shortly after she moved from Oatlands Junior School to St Aidan’s High School, an opportunity came up. Kerry said:
“In her first term at St Aidan’s, they wanted a flower girl to meet the Queen when she was opening the Sun Pavilion. [Head of year 7 and family friend] John Wood put her forward.”
Lynda was selected and presented the Queen with a bouquet during the visit. Kerry said she took the whole thing in her stride.
“Lynda was pretty unfazed about anything like that.”
A keen swimmer, Lynda joined the disability swimming squad at the Hydro and, for 12 years, took part in the British Transplant Games.
Lynda Morrison, standing third from the right, was part of the Freeman Children’s Transplant Team
In 2004, she was given the opportunity to meet the Australian swimming squad, including Ian Thorpe. Her parents said she was more excited about that meeting than when she met the Queen.
In 2006, as a result of the medication she was taking, Lynda’s kidneys began to fail. Fortunately, her mum proved to be a match and was able to become a donor for her daughter.
The operation improved Lynda’s health and, removing the need for frequent dialysis, gave her back her freedom.
Still keen on sport, Lynda volunteered at the London Paralympics in 2012, staying with friends nearby and catching the train to the Olympic park each day.
A trip to Rome in 2014 was made extra special after Kerry booked tickets to see Pope Francis speak. When a member of staff heard it was the 20th anniversary of Lynda’s heart transplant, he arranged for them both to receive a blessing from the Pope.
Lynda, as always, was pleased but unfazed by the honour.
Lynda Morrison at the European Heart and Lung Transplant Games in the Netherlands
She was a keen traveller, going to France, Sweden, Lithuania and Poland for the European Heart and Lung Games – often happily leaving her parents at home to go with her fellow transplant team members.
She also enjoyed family holidays around the world, most recently to Venice in the spring with older sister Deborah and their mum.
In May this year, Lynda became ill with an infection and was admitted to York Hospital. She never recovered enough to come home – though that didn’t stop the family getting permission to bring Leo, her beloved cat, to visit her.
Lynda died on September 15, aged 35.
Her heart, transplanted 28 years before, was still going strong until the end.
Her funeral was held earlier this month at St Mark’s Church where she had been a regular member of the congregation. It saw many friends gather to celebrate all she had been able to achieve and to support her family as they grieved.
Lynda’s spare time was devoted to the Cancer Research UK shop where she worked for 14 years and her colleagues, many of whom attended the funeral, have been given her prized collection of Harry Potter memorabilia.
Donations from the funeral were split between Cancer Research UK and Heart Research UK.
Members of the Harrogate Network for Organ Donation Support including Lynda, centre in the white jacket, and mum Kerry, second from left
Lynda and Kerry set up the Harrogate Network for Organ Donation Support a few years ago and a tree was planted in the Valley Gardens in 2020 to mark the 25th anniversary of Lynda’s operation.
The network itself is relatively small, as so few people have had organ donations, but Kerry said its impact is wider than they realised:
“The main idea was for people facing the need for a transplant to talk to people and get support.
“Last week, we went to the bank to close her account and the lady looked at the death certificate and said she knew about the tree. When her mother died in the 1980s, her organs had been donated. This lady said she had seen about the tree and been to visit it.
“These things you find out by chance. I said ‘people don’t talk about it much’. She said ‘I think maybe younger people do’.”
Following Lynda’s death, her parents and sisters are keen to continue to spread the word about the value of organ donation and its impact on individuals and families, long beyond the operation.
They said they were forever indebted to the donor and their family, and to the Freeman Hospital for both the transplant and the many years of care afterwards. Brian added:
“It has given us a family life. We were sat down in York Hospital on the Friday before she died and they said there wasn’t much hope for her. The doctor was very sympathetic but it was all a bit rushed.
“I said, ‘we had this talk 28 years ago in Killingbeck Hospital. She’s packed in an awful lot in those 28 years’.
“That is what organ donation really means to people and to families.”