This is not just any cock-up this is an NYCC and Marks and Spencer's cock-up

I really didn't want to write this post, lots of good stuff is happening for bikey types in Harrogate at the moment, I was worried I would jeopardise some of it. I left it alone for a good six months, but quiet, polite behind the scenes lobbying has got us virtually nowhere. Then I was worried if I did nothing someone would get hurt or even killed and what if i had done nothing? So I'm sorry here goes, I'm going in.

Here is the thing.  Marks and Spencers (they sell posh food in boxes and nice pants) are having a food hall at the Corner of Leeds Road and Hookstone Road, its is being built now. Well that's good I can get my dine in for a tenner deal without going into town, I think the fish choices have gone off a bit recently but I digress.

Our beloved highways department at North Yorkshire County Council are re-modelling the junction as part of this whole shebang. Now when the plans came out there was no provision for bikes at this very busy junction. Not one thing, nothing, zip, nada. Well a great deal of lobbying by Harrogate Cycle Action has got  Advanced Stop Lanes in the design on the Leadhill lane side of the junction. The story from NYCC now is that they can't put these anywhere else as there, "...simply isn't room."

Well it looks like there is some new'ish guidance from the Department of Transport that suggests NYCC are "simply wrong." That these lines which let cyclists get ahead of traffic and so make everyone's lives easier and bikes riders a little safer, can indeed be fitted in even if the roads are too narrow. Anyway have you seen the junction, its wide like the Champs Elysee, you need a telescope to see the other side?

So why are NYCC taking this bizarre course of action? Even after the Prime Minister  David Cameron said in August.

Councils and the Highways Agency will be expected to "up their game", making sure cycling is taken into account from the design stage on trunk road and traffic schemes like road widening and junction improvements.

Well I don't know, I'm baffled but I have written to Tim Coyne the officer at NYCC  who's bag this is. Lets see what he has to say. For my money there appears to be no good reason why NYCC can't fit Advanced Stop Lines in at this junction. Even the Prime Minister wants it to happen but at the moment because of inertia and dogma it won't happen, shame on you NYCC.

And Mark and Spencers the company that gave us plan A (because there is no plan B) that is apparently trying hard to reduce its carbon footprint and be more sustainable. They are inadvertently preventing people taking sustainable transport choices by helping make this junction more bike unfriendly (there will be more traffic lanes after the remodel). HCA lobbied Marks and Spencers about this and they said they had fully complied with the planning process. I'm sure that's true, but come on Marks and Spencers you have to walk the walk, as well as talk it. Remember the, "There is no plan B." bit?

So this isn't just any cockup. Oh no this is a Marks and Spencer's and NYCC cockup.

Update 25/11/2013

I have just been reliably informed that NYCC are now reviewing their decision about Advanced Stop Lanes on Leeds Road, lets hope they see sense and do the right thing. Hopefully I will have more for you soon.