I got no further really on Beryl Burton re-surfacing and the loss of funding, when I dug deeper. Richard Cooper got involved and asked some questions and the Stray FM news team are to run a piece on me whinging about the whole sorry mess. NYCC's position as a response to questions, is that they pulled the funding for the totality of the Beryl Burton so they could spend the money fixing potholes on the roads. Here is part of their response:
Funding of £20k is included in the 2013/14 Highways Capital Programme for cycleway maintenance and the Beryl Burton Cycleway was subsequently identified for the use of this funding with an initial programmed date of May 2013 to carry out the work. A detailed survey of the route revealed that the estimated cost of repairing and resurfacing the whole length of the route was approximately £80k which clearly exceeded the budget for this work. Consequently, the scheme had to be revisited and the areas of greatest need are now to be repaired, this will involve the drainage and surfacing work to the first 500m or so from Bilton Hall Drive to the first cattle grid. The work is scheduled to be carried out in September to avoid the school holiday season.
I appreciate that this may not be the response that you or indeed the cycling groups were hoping for but in these times of significant funding pressures it is necessary for the County Council to make difficult decisions about highway investment.
That leaves another 60K needed to do the whole lot from the cattle grid to the Yorkshire Lass.
Agreed the potholes need filling but the Beryl Burton needs fixing too. Lets see how it rides when they have done the bit they are now committed to. There remains the possibility of some external funding to finish of the re-surfacing more on this if anything comes of it. I'm even thinking about a kickstarter campaign to crowd source some funding.
It Just worries me that we are tinkering round the edges here, patching an already patchy network that was never really planned, let alone finished. That Harrogate's tour legacy will be more low key fiddling that no one will really notice, that won't get people riding and won't lead to a nicer town to travel round.
It Just worries me that we are tinkering round the edges here, patching an already patchy network that was never really planned, let alone finished. That Harrogate's tour legacy will be more low key fiddling that no one will really notice, that won't get people riding and won't lead to a nicer town to travel round.
On a more positive note the Harrogate to Spofforth Route looks to be getting some love. NYCC officers are riding it with Local Cycling activists in the next few days and have expressed some interest in the proposal Harrogate Cycle Action put together a while back. This one still has the potential for a flagship legacy project. When you talk to activists they think NYCC are more willing to consult on what development there is and that's good too.
There are also the NYCC tour legacy proposals floating around and who knows funding may arrive for that. It is just frustrating when NYCC give with one hand and take away with the the other. I wish we had a broad forum to represent the needs of bike riders in town. There are too many people with interests and we don't present a unified front, at least there are plenty of people who seem to be prioritising cycling.
So was the Beryl Burton campaign a success or a failure? Hard to say, probably more has been done than if Cycle Harrogate and a good few others had kept quiet, but as ever its a frustrating process trying to get cycling infrastructure in this town.
So was the Beryl Burton campaign a success or a failure? Hard to say, probably more has been done than if Cycle Harrogate and a good few others had kept quiet, but as ever its a frustrating process trying to get cycling infrastructure in this town.
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