North Yorkshire’s Ambitious ATF2 Plans Turn to Dust

North Yorkshire Council (NYC) has finished its Active Travel Fund 2 (ATF2) scheme on Victoria Avenue Harrogate.

TL;DR

Here’s a brief assessment of the negatives and positives of what was achieved.

Negatives:

• NYC took 5 years to produce any output at all
• initial plans for ATF2 were for four ambitious cycling schemes, but all were scrapped
• we ended up with, in effect, two light-controlled pedestrian crossings for £1 million, which is poor value for money
• an awful lot of contractor time was spent on changing the paving stones on the pavement, which is ‘prettifying the status quo’ and really should be a routine maintenance job

Positives:

• in the end, early release cycle signals were added at either end of Victoria Avenue, which represents a small but welcome improvement for people who already cycle
• the pedestrian crossings are a small improvement for walking, although it was already easy to cross at these points

History of ATF2 in North Yorkshire

NYC was awarded £1,011,750 of ATF2 money in November 2020.

In December 2020, the council confirmed that the money would be spent on three cycling schemes in Harrogate (Victoria Avenue, Oatlands Drive and A59 Knaresborough Road) and one in Whitby.

Years of prevarication and delay followed.

In the end, Active Travel England seems to be have been instrumental in telling NYC to spend what money they had left on a single, dramatically less ambitious, scheme on Victoria Avenue.

Light-Controlled Crossings

There are now light-controlled pedestrian crossings at either end of Victoria Avenue, where previously there were uncontrolled crossings. This is a small improvement for anyone walking.

It wasn’t difficult to cross the road at these locations before.

There are plenty of places in Harrogate where pedestrian crossings are needed and would make a big difference (e.g. Prince of Wales roundabout, or Station Parade opposite Waitrose), but Victoria Avenue wasn’t one of them.

Large Areas of New Paving Stones

A large part of the project seems to have been replacing perfectly good but weathered paving stones with new ones.

To me, that should be routine maintenance, not part of a scheme that is supposed to be making active travel improvements.

LTN 1/20 Cycle Infrastructure Design takes the same view, and describes this sort of scheme as ‘prettifying the status quo’.

Footway Build-Out

The pavement at the bottom of Victoria Avenue has been built out slightly to try to stop drivers making illegal movements from Beech Grove to Victoria Avenue.

We will have to wait and see if it is effective. The key time will be when term starts and parents are once again driving their children to school.

Zebra Crossing at the Library

There was already a zebra crossing of Victoria Avenue at the Library, but the metal railings there have now been removed.

Bollard Removed from Fragment of Cycle Track

There’s a fragment of cycle track which allows people on bikes to go straight across Station Parade.

It had a bollard in it, which prevented people on larger cycles from using it. The bollard has now been removed.

Early Release Cycle Signals

Low-level cycle signals have been added at either end of Victoria Avenue. They give people on bikes a 4 second head start on general traffic and are a small but welcome improvement for those who already cycle.

They imply cycling in mixed traffic so they are very unlikely to persuade new people – who feel that sharing the road with motor vehicles is too dangerous – to get around by bike.