Active Travel England Involved in Design of Harrogate Cycle Schemes

Active Travel England (ATE) are involved in the designs of Harrogate’s Active Travel Fund 2 (ATF2) schemes, it emerged at a council meeting today.

ATE’s involvement should mean that the projects are designed to professional standards.

The ATF2 schemes are for cycling infrastructure:

• from High Bridge Knaresborough to the Golf Club at Starbeck and
• on Victoria Avenue

Construction should have been complete by 31st March 2022, but it has been delayed repeatedly. The latest vague date announced by North Yorkshire County Council is “the New Year”.

Comments about ATE’s involvement came as a N Yorkshire County Council officer tried to explain delays to the ATF2 cycle schemes as well as the Otley Road cycleway and the Oatlands Feasibility Study. All the projects are massively behind schedule.

Harrogate Transport Improvement Programme

The Harrogate Transport Improvement Programme (HTIP) was also discussed at the meeting. HTIP emerged from the 2019 Harrogate Congestion Study, and was supposed to come up with plans for sustainable travel improvements on the A61 from Pannal to Harrogate.

N Yorkshire have done a Phase 1 report, and are now doing a Phase 2 study which is likely to report at the end of 2022. For all the time spent on studies, reports and meetings, it never seems to result in any on-the-ground improvements.

Get a Move On – Comments from Councillors

Cllr Paul Haslam commented that ‘we seem to be lost in process’ and he would like to see more action.

Cllr Chris Aldred said that the current active travel schemes have been identified as good and positive and are funded through ATE. ‘We need to stop talking about things and get a move on.’

Cllr Philip Broadbank echoed those sentiments. ‘We seem to be bogged down, I don’t know what it is. We need to have the real impetus to get on and do things. We’re going round in circles all the time…and we just need to make progress.’