Members of the public may ask questions or make statements at this meeting if they have given notice to Melanie Carr of Democratic and Scrutiny Services and supplied the text (contact details below) by midday on Thursday 14 September, three working days before the day of the meeting. Each speaker should limit themselves to 3 minutes on any item. Members of the public who have given notice will be invited to speak:
· at this point in the meeting if their questions/statements relate to matters which are not otherwise on the Agenda (subject to an overall time limit of 30 minutes);
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Minutes:
There was one public statement submitted by Mr David Mitchell, on behalf of Harrogate Cycle Action as follows:
‘Transforming
Cities Fund (TCF) Harrogate Station Gateway is North Yorkshire Council's
flagship active travel project. We have
supported it throughout the 4 years of its development and continue to do so.
Judicial Review
and Democratic Process
A private
individual or company is entitled to ensure that the council has followed all
the correct procedures, including through legal action if they deem that
appropriate and can pay the fees. On the
other hand, council transport policy should be decided by the council through
the democratic process and in the public interest, not by a private company
through the courts.
The Executive made
clear at its meeting on 30th May 2023 that it was committed to the ambitious
Station Gateway scheme as designed by the TCF team. It should uphold that
commitment rather than designing a scheme specifically to appease the applicant
for judicial review. We fully understand
that there may need to be some compromise, but we do not accept that the scheme
should be so stripped of ambition as to be a homeopathic version of the
original.
The aims of the
TCF funding are to:
• improve public transport and active travel
options
• take a significant number of car trips off
the road
• contribute to jobs and the economy
• support connectivity to housing and employment
sites and
•
tackle inequality
Option 1 before
the Executive today involves:
• changing the traffic lights to enable more
motor traffic to go along Station Parade faster
• different paving stones on the pedestrian
areas and
• no cycle infrastructure at all
It does not meet
the objectives of the Transforming Cities Fund and it would let down:
• the people who asked for better cycling and
walking facilities in the 2019 Congestion Survey (77% of 15,500 respondents)
and
• the 832 people who said in the 3rd Station
Gateway consultation that the proposed walking and cycling infrastructure would
have a positive effect on their travel, vs 743 people who said that it would be
negative
Our message to the
Executive is that we understand it isn't easy to deliver this scheme, but it's
the
right thing to
do. The scheme as originally designed
meets the objectives of the Transforming Cities Fund, which Council Leader Carl
Les signed up to 2019. It also makes a
start on achieving the transport decarbonisation goals in the Routemap to
Carbon Negative, which has been endorsed by NYC. We are relying on you to use the Transforming
Cities Fund money to deliver a transformative scheme.’
As Mr Mitchell was
not present at the meeting, the Chair noted that all Executive Members had
received the statement prior to the meeting and had the opportunity to consider
it in full. He therefore chose not to
have the statement read out.
Councillor Keane
Duncan acknowledged the submission and gave assurance that it would be taken account
of at the appropriate time through the decision making process, as the
Authority looked at the options moving forward for the TCF Programme in
Harrogate.