Stop drivers using Harrogate’s Cold Bath Road ‘as a racetrack’, says resident

A three-car crash on Harrogate’s Cold Bath Road was “always going to happen” because drivers use the street as a racetrack, according to a local resident.

A Volkswagen Golf heading towards Otley Road crashed into two parked cars at the junction with West Cliffe Road at 3.10am on Sunday morning, leaving one passenger unconscious. No other injuries were reported.

One local resident contacted the Stray Ferret to say the road “becomes a racetrack” after 10.30pm and called on the authorities to do more to tackle the issue.

He claimed those involved bragged they were doing more than 100mph and said it was time for speed cameras or traffic calming measures.

‘No one does anything about it’

The road includes a 20mph stretch, which was implemented outside Western Primary School in February last year.

But a resident in the Cold Bath Road area, who asked not to be named, said this was not observed despite the speed indicator being shown throughout the day.

They said they had written to North Yorkshire County Council to call for further measures as drivers “never slow down”. The crash on Sunday morning prompted them to write to the authority again.

“They do it all the time.

“After 10.30pm, it becomes a racetrack and no one does anything about it. It [the crash] was always going to happen.

“Just put speed cameras up. I’m a driver and when I see a speed camera, then I adjust my speed.”

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North Yorkshire Police continues to investigate the Cold Bath Road crash and has appealed for witnesses and CCTV footage.

No arrests have been made in connection with the incident.

A police statement added:

“It is only by sheer luck that the collision didn’t result in a fatality.

“As part of the investigation we would like to appeal to local residents and businesses to check their CCTV systems and ring doorbells around the time of the collision as it may have captured the vehicle, the collision, and anyone making off from the scene shortly afterwards.

“Additionally, if anyone has any other information about the incident which may assist our enquiries please contact us quoting reference 12220038835.”

Council to pilot banning cars outside North Yorkshire schools

Cars could be banned on streets directly outside many schools at drop-off and pick-up times to improve safety, encourage active travel and cut pollution.

North Yorkshire County Council looks set to examine the impacts of the Department Of Transport-backed School Streets initiative over 18 months, just weeks after ratifying a new 20mph zone policy, under which the authority has undertaken to scrutinise where it could lower speed limits outside schools.

While the move followed years of pressure from road safety campaigners calling for blanket 20mph zones across all built-up areas in the county, the authority has insisted such action would not be suitable everywhere.

The authority’s executive member for access, Cllr Don Mackenzie, said it hoped if a Safer Streets pilot outside Seamer and Irton Community Primary School was successful, that the initiative would complement the council’s 20mph zone policy.

The trial would involve the school placing a ‘Road Closed’ sign across the road by the school at the appropriate times.

However, an officer’s report on the proposal states while North Yorkshire Police would be responsible for enforcing road closures, the force had advised that “it is supportive of School Streets, but could not resource enforcement”.

The council officer’s report states:

“An appropriately applied scheme should minimise the risk of regular contravention and enforcement issues.”

It states the trial will be judged on whether it has led to an increase in active travel, cut traffic speeds and volumes in the area and the impact on the surrounding community and environment, but it was anticipated Schools Streets would not be appropriate for the majority of locations.

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The move comes weeks after a Transport for London study of 300 established School Streets found most people believed the vehicle bans had pushed congestion and parking issues elsewhere, while the lack of enforcement created safety concerns.

Coun Mackenzie said introducing restrictions in front of schools could displace parking problems elsewhere, but added:

“I would rather have the problem removed from in front of schools because that is an area that deserves more protection than any other.”

“We fully appreciate, and I personally understand, why the police have areas of greater concern to them to enforce than 20mph limits. In North Yorkshire we have very very few road traffic incidents involving injury in our built-up areas where there is a 30mph limit.

“We’re looking at other interventions to improve safety outside schools, to persuade people not to park in front of schools, or even worse, to drop their children off and leave the engine running.

“If this pilot is successful we will look to introduce it in many other locations in front of schools.”

North Yorkshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner Zoë Metcalfe said decisions on how North Yorkshire Police enforced any restrictions put in place were operational ones for the chief constable and her team.

She said:

“North Yorkshire Police will always prioritise those areas where there is greatest risk to road users and will deliver on road safety enforcement activity where appropriate with partners.

“Once decisions are made by the county council, I am sure all groups and organisations in the York and North Yorkshire Road Safety Partnership will come together to discuss how any School Streets projects can be implemented and supported as part of the wider delivery of the recently published Safer Roads Strategy.”

Commissioner candidates questioned: how to stop speeding

In the fourth of a series of articles on crime issues in the Harrogate district, candidates standing to be North Yorkshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner are questioned on how to stop speeding. 

Commissioner candidates vying to become North Yorkshire’s next Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner say they would launch a hard-hitting educational campaign, pressure for more 20mph limits and even consider drafting in firefighters to help tackle residents’ number one concern – speeding.

Ahead of the residents of York and North Yorkshire going to the polls on Thursday to decide who gets the £74,00-a-year role, the five candidates wanting to succeed Philip Allott, who resigned last month amid controversy, have spoken of their determination to get to grips with road safety enforcement and education.

During his time in the role Mr Allott enlisted academics to help tackle speeding on more than 6,000 miles of roads and in 800 villages, saying demand for enforcement was outstripping police resources.

Most of the 72 county councillors agree speeding, and in particular through villages, is the most common issue that residents raise with them.

While fixed speed cameras have repeatedly been deemed an unsuitable solution for the largely rural county, the force has insisted its 12 mobile speed camera vans are used to deter speeding at sites of accidents.

The county’s first commissioner, Julia Mulligan, frequently defended the use of the vans and denied they were being used as a revenue generator, despite many residents, councillors and even former police traffic officers believing the contrary.

Independent

Independent candidate Keith Tordoff said enforcement was not the only answer to tackling speeding and that he would develop new ways of dealing with road safety, involving interaction from other agencies such as North Yorkshire County Council. He said he would examine whether the Fire & Rescue Service could help.

He added he was a supporter of the 20’s Plenty scheme, but was only in favour of reducing speed limits on roads near schools, high streets and where the community overwhelmingly wants to.

Labour

Labour candidate Emma Scott-Spivey said she was backing 20’s Plenty as “road safety is a huge issue across North Yorkshire – not just in built up areas but on our country lanes and major highways”.

She said:

“Some argue that spending money on reducing speeds and improving road safety should not be an expense of fighting ‘real crime’. I don’t agree at all. We must do everything we can to reduce speeds, reduce accidents and reduce fatalities. Police officers and firefighters agree those are very real.”

Liberal Democrat

Stopping short of expressly backing 20s Plenty,  James Barker, of the Liberal Democrats, highlighted how lower traffic volumes during lockdowns led to some shocking levels of speeding, particularly on 30mph roads.

He said:

“If elected I will oversee a review of the police’s approach to enforcing speed limits, including how mobile speed cameras are deployed and revisiting the issue of fixed speed cameras. I will also explore ways to increase collaboration with local authorities and communities to promote community safety.”

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Conservative

Zoe Metcalfe, who is hoping to become the third Conservative in succession to land the role, said education and more publicity were needed as part of the speeding management strategy.

She said:

“I would like to see an emphasis placed on showing drivers the impacts of their speeding from being an anti-social behaviour, a serious and dangerous activity and how their own lives can be impacted if caught breaking the law.”

Women’s Equality Party

Women’s Equality Party candidate Hannah Barham-Brown, said as a wheelchair user, speeding was a major concern for her.

She added:

“Although reducing speed limits is outside of my remit as Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner I will work with local councils and residents to advocate for road safety and to ensure that residents’ concerns are being heard.”

Call for police action against Harrogate Asda car park ‘boy racers’

A Harrogate resident has called for police action against ‘boy racers’ who regularly descend on the town’s Asda car park.

The resident, who lives on Mayfield Grove within earshot of the car park, told the Stray Ferret he would organise a demonstration if nothing was done.

He said people on streets near the store were tired of the noise and had safety concerns about vehicles speeding.

According to the resident, who asked not to be named, about four to six cars belonging mainly to young men congregate nightly in the car park and rev their engines and pop their exhausts.

The resident said they had raised the matter with Philip Allott, the police commissioner for North Yorkshire, and a police community support officer had agreed to visit the supermarket this week to discuss the matter,

They said they would now wait to see what ensued before deciding whether to mobilise support for a demonstration.

“Every night for years these idiots gather in the rear part of Asda car park where they rev their engines then race out of the car park and round Harrogate.

“I have video and pics that I gave to Philip Allott of a Mercedes that is there most nights and which nearly wiped out a couple of customers.

“If the police don’t do anything about it, we are going to arrange a demo at Asda.”

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A spokesman for North Yorkshire Police said:

“We are aware of anti-social-behaviour problems around the Mayfield Grove area of Harrogate, in particular issues with speeding vehicles.

“We will be actively deploying specialist resource to the area which will include roads policing officers who will be robustly dealing with any offences.

“Officers will also be linking in other local organisations and utilising local CCTV to help us build intelligence.”

The spokesman said these measures were in addition to North Yorkshire Police’s ongoing Operation Crome initiative to tackle anti-social and illegal driving.

An Asda spokesman said:

‘’We thank the vast majority who use our car parks responsibly and we will work with the authorities to ensure that the spaces around our stores remain safe for our customers.’’

Two new portable speed cameras to patrol Ripon

Ripon City Council has announced two speeding signs will be purchased for the city.

The initiative is in partnership with North Yorkshire County Council and will see two vehicle activated speed signs for the city.

The signs show the speed of the car as it approaches.

The council has identified a number of roads with cars often spotted going too fast. The roads are heavily used, often with children and families walking on pavements at peak hours.

These include:

The signs will move around these roads from next week.

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Inspector Alex Langley of North Yorkshire Police welcomed the initiative, commenting that the implementation of this new technology should remind the road users of Ripon about excess speed and hopefully educate and encourage them to slow down.

He said:

“North Yorkshire Police fully supports this campaign and we will continue to take positive action against those road users that continue to speed and commit driving offence.”

Academics to review speed limit enforcement in North Yorkshire

A police commissioner has unveiled plans to enlist academics to help tackle speeding across England’s largest county.

Philip Allott, North Yorkshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner, said he aimed to enable the force to deal decisively with safety on rural roads and in villages. But with more than 6,000 miles of roads and 800 villages to cover, demand for enforcement was outstripping police resources.

Mr Allott said universities had been invited to tender to review how speed limits are enforced in the county and he was hopeful work to come up with alternatives would shortly get underway.

He was speaking to North Yorkshire County Council’s Richmondshire constituency committee following years of controversy surrounding North Yorkshire Police’s speed camera vans.

While fixed speed cameras have repeatedly been deemed an unsuitable solution for the largely rural county, the force has insisted the vans are used to deter speeding at sites of accidents.

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Julia Mulligan, Mr Allott’s predecessor, frequently defended the use of the vans and denied they were a revenue generator.

Last year she tweeted: 

“Any cash raised is spent on road safety, but they are largely self-funding, and certainly not ‘cash cows’. We also have clear evidence of behaviour change and lives saved.”

Nevertheless, motorists, including former police traffic officers and a number of leading councillors, believe the vans have frequently been sent to sites, such as bridges over motorways or dual carriageway laybys, in a bid to maximise numbers of fines.

Just 35 traffic officers

After being elected Mr Allott said there were “big concerns” over the vans, which were introduced in 2011.

He told the constituency committee while speeding was a prominent issue for residents, the force had just 35 traffic officers to oversee enforcement.

Mr Allott said: 

“The issue for us is that for the safety camera vans there are 750 sites for 12 vans plus two motorcycle units, and they can’t possibly go to every location.”

Mr Allott said he wanted elected community representatives to be able to direct police towards the areas of greatest concern.

He said: 

“What I would like to move towards is a position where if you say ‘I want the camera van to go out here or there’, you can have that as a councillor three times a year.”

Referring to calls for 20mph zones in some built-up areas, he said neither the camera vans nor hand-held speed guns were calibrated as low as 20mph.

He added: 

“If you are a councillor and wanting a lower speed limit, I as commissioner will support it. There are some challenges and you can see why I want an academic institute to look at this.”

Drug-driving mum escapes jail after 80mph police chase round Harrogate

A drug-driving mother-of-three has been spared jail after leading police on a high speed car chase around Harrogate.

Jasmine Wilson, 26, reached speeds of up to 88mph on icy roads in her Vauxhall Astra — at some stages on the wrong side of the road — during the chase on January 3.

Wilson, from Pateley Bridge, sped faster after police put on their blue lights and accelerated to 82mph on the wrong side of the road in a National Speed Limit area, said prosecutor Brooke Morrison.

She then swung the vehicle around a sharp bend at 60mph and at Whipley Bank once again crossed over onto the wrong side of the road, driving at 70mph before tearing through a 50mph zone at 84mph, York Crown Court heard.

Wilson, who was three times over the limit for cannabis and had a male passenger in the car, then overtook another vehicle on a right-hand bend “at some speed”, said Ms Morrison.

She then shot straight over crossroads at 48mph without stopping and reached peak speeds of 88mph as she took another right-hand bend on the wrong side of the road, where she lost control of the Astra, which came to a halt in a field.

The chase lasted around 13 minutes, said Ms Morrison.

Smoking cannabis

Wilson, of High Crest, was taken to hospital by ambulance along with her male passenger, both of whom were relatively unscathed. She was also uninsured to drive the car, which belonged to her partner.

Wilson told police she had been smoking cannabis earlier in the day and that was why she didn’t stop.

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She admitted drug-driving, dangerous driving and having no insurance and appeared for sentence yesterday.

The court heard that Wilson had a clean record until the police chase, which began at about 9.50pm when police were informed by witnesses of what they thought was a drink-driver travelling around the Harrogate area.

Temitayo Dasaolu, mitigating, said Wilson’s actions “made sense to her” at the time because she had been smoking cannabis and didn’t want to get caught.

Responsibilities as a mother

Judge Sean Morris, the Recorder of York, said the offences were so serious that only a custodial sentence could be justified, but that he could suspend the inevitable jail term because Wilson had caring responsibilities as a young mother.

He said Wilson had “put all that at risk” by her actions which risked the lives of police officers and other road-users.

He added that Wilson was “one of the few people” convicted of such crimes who would walk free, but only because of her lack of previous convictions and responsibilities as a mother.

Wilson was given an eight-month suspended prison sentence and a 40-day rehabilitation programme. She was banned from driving for 12 months.

Villagers in Burnt Yates put up scarecrows to tackle speeding

Families in Burnt Yates have built scarecrows, one of which depicts the grim reaper, to remind motorists driving through the village not to speed.

The idea came from Loraine and Sid Hines, who have lived in Burnt Yates for 30 years and worry that speeding cars and ‘boy racers’ will cause serious injury or death.

They have set up a Burnt Yates Speed Committee to tackle the problem.

The speed limit through Burnt Yates is 30mph, with a 20mph section near the school. However, the section of the B6165 leaving the village has a 50mph limit and Ms Hines said more vehicles were exceeding this in recent years.

The committee offered prizes of £30, £20 and £10 for the best scarecrow and every family who entered got a tub of sweets.

However, Ms Hines said two of the scarecrows have been vandalised and one has been stolen since they went up.

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Ms Hines has called on North Yorkshire County Council, which is the highways authority, to reduce the speed limit of the B6165 to 30mph.

She said:

“We want something done about the sheer volume of speed and blatant disregard for the rules”.

The council told the Stray Ferret it did not support a reduction in the speed limit.

Nigel Smith, head of highway operations, said:

“Given the accident history of this section of the B6165 and the guidance on which the police’s decisions have to be based, we cannot, at this time, support the request for a reduced speed limit.”

Villagers campaign to cut ‘dangerous’ speed limit in Burnt Yates

Villagers in Burnt Yates have launched a campaign to reduce the ‘dangerous’ speed limit of the main B6165.

Loraine and Sid Hines have lived in Burnt Yates for 30 years and worry that speeding cars and ‘boy racers’ will cause serious injury or death.

The speed limit through Burnt Yates is 30mph, with a 20mph section near the school. However, the section of the B6165 leaving the village has a 50mph limit and Ms Hines said more vehicles were exceeding this in recent years.

They have set up a Burnt Yates Speed Committee and launched a petition to reduce the limit to 30mph. So far the petition has had 123 signatures.

Ms Hines said she has written to North Yorkshire County Council requesting a speed limit reduction but has received “brush-offs”.

She added:

“North Yorkshire County Council is reactive, not proactive.

“We want something done about the sheer volume of speed and blatant disregard for the rules”.

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North Yorkshire County Council told the Stray Ferret it did not support a reduction in the speed limit.

Nigel Smith, head of highway operations, said:

“Our local highways team has thoroughly investigated residents’ concerns. As always, our priority is public safety, so we must ensure that we use our resources where they are most needed.

“Police support is needed for any change to the speed limit, and the police work to government guidelines set out by the Department of Transport. This section of road does not meet these requirements for a speed limit change to work. Everything that can be done regarding speed limit restrictions is already in place.

“Accident reports for the past five years have been reviewed to look for any patterns, frequency or root cause that would support a change in the speed limit or the introduction of traffic calming measures. This review shows there has been one serious accident in the Burnt Yates area in the past five years. This was attributed to driver error.

“We need to consider the risks against the benefits for this and other locations across North Yorkshire to ensure our resources are best deployed to improve road safety.

“Given the accident history of this section of the B6165 and the guidance on which the police’s decisions have to be based, we cannot, at this time, support the request for a reduced speed limit.”

Masham call for volunteers to catch speeders

Masham Parish Council is calling for new recruits to join its Community Speed Watch programme.

An investigation by North Yorkshire Police in August 2020 found Thorpe Road would benefit from a group monitoring speeding drivers.

Cars were only caught driving slightly faster than the 30mph limit but the police still thought it necessary to set up the watch group.

It patrols the area along Thorpe Road near Ibbetson Close heading north into Masham.

The group is currently made up of five volunteers but needs a new speed watch coordinator.

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What is a community speed watch group?

The coordinator role is the main point of contact between the project and the police.

New volunteers receive all the necessary training and go through risk assessments before heading out onto the roads.

To get involved contact Masham Parish Council via mashamparishclerk@gmail.com.