In this article, which is part of a series on the 12 stories in the Harrogate district that shaped 2023, we look at the Harrogate Station Gateway saga in 2023.

The year 2023 was supposed to be the year when the Harrogate Station Gateway started to happen.

After years of talk, work would begin on reducing a section of Station Parade to single lane and James Street would be partly pedestrianised. But not a single shovel has entered the ground and the scheme remains mired in mess.

A meeting of North Yorkshire Council’s Harrogate and Knaresborough area constituency committee was supposed to bring clarity in May.

Cllr Keane Duncan, the council’s Conservative executive member for transport, turned the heat up on the Liberal Democrat-controlled committee beforehand by warning the scheme would be dead if the committee didn’t back it. The “majority of spend”, he added, must take place in 2023/24 budgets so there could be no delay.

Councillors voted 10-3 in favour, which paved the way for Cllr Duncan and the rest of the council’s ruling Conservative executive to press the go button. But the political consensus didn’t last long. The Lib Dems quickly withdrew their support, claiming the council had not engaged in meaningful consultation as promised in May.

Cllr Keane Duncan talks about the Station Gateway to Harrogate District Chamber of Commerce.

They called on Cllr Duncan, who would later win the Conservative nomination to stand in next year’s York and North Yorkshire mayoral election, to resign. He accused the Lib Dems of “weak and inconsistent leadership” and “playing games with the scheme”.

Meanwhile, local property firm Hornbeam Park Developments, which owns some buildings on James Street, launched a judicial review to challenge the council’s decision making.

Lawyers claimed there were six grounds for challenge, including the council’s failure to hold a public inquiry before issuing traffic regulation orders for the scheme. In August, the council confirmed it had “quashed” its May decision to proceed with the gateway. It conceded:

“Due to the necessity of having a public inquiry before confirming the relevant traffic regulation order, it was considered prudent to accept this ground of challenge.”

A Harrogate District Cycle Action graphic showing the scrapped elements.

This prompted Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough MP, to say the gateway was a” timed-out dead scheme” and offer to intervene to help retain the funding locally.

But the council, which had previously insisted the scheme would be dead if it wasn’t approved, ploughed on and began hastily assembling new proposals.

By November, they suggested public realm improvements to Station Square and One Arch, which is the foot tunnel under the railway at the bottom end of Station Parade, improved access into the bus station and linked sequencing of the traffic lights between the Ripon Road/King’s Road and the Station Parade/Victoria Avenue junctions. The possibility of a southbound segregated cycle lane on Station Parade, while retaining two lanes for motorised traffic, is also being explored.

The political wrangling continued when Lib Dem leader Cllr Pat Marsh accused Cllr Duncan of “pinching” their ideas.

The scheme is one of three worth £42 million being funded by the government’s Transforming Cities Fund to improve station gateways to town centres in Harrogate, Selby and Skipton.

Read more:

• Cyclists brand scaled-back Harrogate gateway plans a ‘huge disappointmen’
• Councillors push ahead with scaled-back £11.2m Harrogate Station Gateway
• Council concedes it should have held public inquiry into Harrogate Station Gateway

By the end of the year all three had been “de-scoped” because “cost estimates have significantly increased during the detailed design development period”, according to a council report.

The council was keen to gloss over questions about its handling of a scheme, and how it had breached public law by failing to issue traffic regulation orders — particularly as it had awarded £2 million to consultants for help.

Cyclists were frustrated by the loss of what was once hailed as a key project in establishing a secure route from the town centre to Cardale Park. The gateway lexicon had also changed from being about active travel to sustainable transport, suggesting it’s more about better traffic lights than encouraging walking and cycling.

Councillors are expected to decide early in 2024 whether to accept the smaller Harrogate scheme — assuming the government lets the deadline slip. It appears smaller and less controversial than the original plans — but little about the gateway is ever straightforward.

Cycling campaigners have described North Yorkshire Council’s scaled-back plans for Harrogate’s station gateway as a “huge disappointment”. 

The plans originally envisioned a radical transformation of the town centre’s main thoroughfare, with traffic on Station Parade reduced to one lane to allow for cycle lanes, as well as the part-pedestrianisation of James Street and a cycle-friendly Dutch-style roundabout at the junction of Station Bridge and East Parade. 

But a legal challenge by Hornbeam Park Developments put a stop to the scheme, and those elements have now been dropped. 

The revised scheme may now only include a redeveloped One Arch and Station Square, better traffic signals, a bus lane on lower Station Parade, new paving for pedestrians and cycling parking at Harrogate railway station. 

Several of the scheme’s major elements have been scrapped.

In a statement, Harrogate District Cycle Action (HDCA) said: 

“From a cycling point of view, most of the worthwhile elements have been stripped out of the scheme. 

“If cycle parking had been proposed on its own, we would have supported it. If cycle parking is all that’s left of what was an ambitious scheme which would also have enabled people to reach the station by bike in safety and comfort, it will inevitably be a huge disappointment.” 

The Harrogate scheme is one of three in North Yorkshire – the others are in Skipton and Selby – that are being developed with £42 million from the government’s Transforming Cities Fund (TCF). 

The TCF is a £2.45 billion capital grant fund aimed at driving up productivity through investments in public and sustainable transport infrastructure in England. 

HDCA was also critical of some of the elements of the scheme which will remain, such as the coordination of traffic lights, which it said would only benefit motorists. 

It said: 

“Driving is, by definition, unsustainable transport, and in our view TCF money should not be spent on this. 

“Five sets of lights are coordinated along West Park/Parliament Street. What is the effect for pedestrians? Extremely long wait times.  

“To see the long wait times at the prestige town centre location outside Bettys is shameful. We can expect the same thing on Station Parade.” 

The proposal for a Dutch-style roundabout at the junction of Station Bridge and East Parade has been scrapped.

HDCA member Malcolm Margolis, who was awarded the British Empire Medal in 2019 for services to cycling in Harrogate, said the gutting of the station gateway scheme meant it now fell far short of its original aims. 

He said: 

“The main way that Station Gateway could have made Harrogate a better place to live was by reducing the dominance of motor vehicles – and the noise, danger and pollution that they cause – in the town centre, by reducing Station Parade to one lane. 

“It seems that is now not going to happen, so TCF will not have a transformative effect on Harrogate, whatever the final details. 

“The most disappointing aspect of all is that it is proposed to spend sustainable transport funding to prioritise cars.” 

The council must now undertake more public consultation, publish updated Traffic Regulation Orders and submit a new business case to West Yorkshire Combined Authority, which won the initial funding. It expects this process to take another five months. 

If the business case is approved next summer, work on the scheme could begin by autumn 2024, but that will not leave much time for its construction. 

The Department for Transport has previously insisted that all projects must be built before March 2025.

Read more:

• Work hub removed from Harrogate rail station
• Councillors push ahead with scaled-back £11.2m Harrogate Station Gateway
• Tory transport chief urges Lib Dems to back scaled-back Harrogate Station Gateway

North Yorkshire County Council said it remains committed to providing extra cycle and walk ways even though it said it was “disappointed” with the amount of money its been given by central government.

The county council bid for money from the Government’s “emergency active travel fund” to provide extra support for sustainable travel as part of the national recovery from coronavirus.

But the council was only allocated £133,000, half of the possible maximum available.

County Councillor Don Mackenzie, Executive Member for Access, said:

“We have a long-standing commitment to active, sustainable travel, and that remains undimmed. The allocation from this first tranche of funding is disappointing, but we will learn from this bid and are determined to take full advantage of the next phase of funding and beyond”

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Harrogate District Cycling Action gave us this statement:

It’s disappointing that NYCC has only received 50% of the Tranche 1 amount provisionally allocated to it (which was £266,000). It must be because the plans presented weren’t ambitious enough.

There’s an opportunity later in the summer to bid for a further £1,065,000, and we would like NYCC to work with us in developing the best possible bid. The recent Harrogate Congestion Survey showed 77% support for improved walking & cycling infrastructure. This is an opportunity to invest in it, and it’s vital it isn’t wasted.

The authority said it was planning to bid for the second wave of cash. Cllr Mackenzie said:

“Initial feedback from the Department for Transport indicates that the drive behind this first tranche of the fund is to enable people travelling on public transport, particularly those going to and from work, to instead cycle or walk.

This is primarily an issue for large urban areas which have much higher levels of this sort of public transport usage.. Presently, our main impetus is creating town centre spaces to enable social distancing.

“We await guidance on the requirements for the second phase, which is likely to see an emphasis on schemes identified through our local walking and cycling infrastructure plans, which will be more permanent measures.

 

Approximately 60 cyclists joined a rally organised by the climate change activist group, Extinction Rebellion, in Harrogate this morning calling for safer streets for walkers and cyclists.

Two community police officers looked on as the group set off from Library Gardens and circled around the centre of Harrogate.  The rally spread out and kept in groups of 6 from a household- the mood was friendly and upbeat.

Organiser Vicky Wild said lockdown had seen a big increase in people using and buying bicycles but the worry was as life returns to normal, it won’t be safe to use them:

“Now is the time to hold this rally and call for safer streets for cyclists and walkers. Let’s not go back to to normal in every way. Today we’ve been joined by ordinary people – in this group there’s a doctor, a teacher, a shopkeeper- families and people of all ages. Everyone feels strongly about it.”

The start of the rally on Victoria Park Avenue

Read More:

• The agony of getting a single cycle route built in Harrogate
• Highways chief defends cycling progress

Carl and Jo Summerscales and their 3 children, Eva, Will and Teddy joined the rally. Dad Carl said the roads, and in particular, the school run roads, need to be safer.:

“I think the people in charge are putting their heads in the sand — they seem to want to stop cycling rather than put cycle paths in, especially as there is now extra money for this.  I think for children cycling to school it’s just so dangerous.”

Mum Jo added:

“Will in particular cycles two miles to school and we’ve worked really hard to find a safe route at peak time- it’s worrying there’s so much traffic”

Above: The Summerscales family, Carl, Jo, Eva, Will and Teddy

Extinction Rebellion flags were set out by organisers