The traffic queues that daily stretch all the way from Headingley Hill to Hyde Park Corner are soon to become a thing of the past. And the jam that stretches from the city centre to the junction with Clarendon Road is also to be consigned to history.
The highways engineers behind NGT have come up with a scheme which will transfer both traffic jams onto the stretch of the A660 that crosses Woodhouse Moor. Currently this is a dual carriageway where traffic flows freely. And as a dual carriageway, it is much wider than the stretches of the A660 to either side of it which daily become jammed with traffic. By cleverly progamming the traffic lights on the the A660, the highways engineers hope to get traffic quickly off the narrower stretches of road, and onto Woodhouse Moor using what is known as a “vehicle stacking system.” By this means, the trolley bus will be able to travel more quickly along the narrower stretches of road to ether side of Woodhouse Moor.
It’s a sad indictment of Leeds City Council that it’s prepared to exploit an inner city park and expose its users, including families with young children, and students, to the emissions produced by stacked traffic.
NGT involves running trolley buses over already really congested roads with NGT involves running trolley buses over already really congested roads with long distances between stops (meaning lack of convenience for passengers). To proceed with this ill-advised scheme simply to get Governnent money would seem to be very short sighted if not downright irresponsible. How much better to scrap it now and start work on building an underground system. Only an underground scheme can meet the needs of Leeds, a sprawling city with a defined centre. Conferences held in Amsterdam point the way forward for such schemes (modern ones, not Victorian ones like the London Underground). Tunnelling is now very much cheaper than you would imagine.
It would be a labour intensive infrastructure scheme, of just the type the Coalition Government is proposing to take Britain out of recession. It would be costly, but the cost would be in jobs – which surely can’t be bad for the Leeds economy. The scheme could be designed and then implemented gradually as Government money is made available. Once built, it would confirm the importance of Leeds as a prime UK city.
If we had started on this 20 years ago, most of it would be built by now. Once built, we will have it for generations. Just think what it would do for the vitality and future of Leeds.
Annn article in the Yorkshire Evening Post informs us that the NGT trolleybus An article in the Yorkshire Evening Post informs us that the NGT trolleybus scheme has been given the green light, but fails to mention that the proposed route will take it across Woodhouse Moor.
The original idea behind NGT was to get people out of their cars and onto public transport. But somewhere along the line, the planners have lost sight of that. Incredibly, the reason they want NGT to run across the Moor, is so that inbound motorists won’t be held up by the trolleybus at the junction of Woodhouse Lane with Clarendon Road. Don’t they realise that if motorists are held up by the trolleybus at this junction, that’s just the incentive they need to get them out of their cars and onto the bus?
Woodhouse Moor is the only one of our inner city moors to have escaped the motorway building frenzy of the sixties and seventies. Now it too is to be sacrificed to the motor car.
The proposed NGT trolley bus for Leeds does not decrease carbon dioxide pollution; it just delocalises it away back to a coal fired power station. The transmission losses actually increase carbon dioxide pollution. It will do less than buses do as it can’t be deployed for school runs, specials, and can’t be used off its wires. It only covers a small part of the city. Bus lanes and cycle lanes will be removed. Mature trees dug up, Yorkshire stone walls removed and more concrete installed at junctions. The private companies that build and run it will make a fortune out of the initial public investment of £250+ million.
Only a deprivatised, locally controlled, cheap, integrated transport system will make a dfference to our mad, congested car culture.
The NGT has attracted much adverse comment in the YEP. An extract is given below:
“Wow! Buses on wires! I can barely cope with the excitement. It’ll be like riding on a bus. With wires!
We’ll be able to look up to the sky, and see wire after wire. I liked the wire, so I’m all for it! It’ll only cost the GDP of a small country, and I like buses too!”
We need more urban railway stations. There are six that could be rebuilt now. There are regional rail lines that could be restored such as the Wetherby line. Leeds should spend the £250 million as it sees fit and ignore this central Government publicity stunt. Its just an election promise which will just be cancelled in a few years time.
A large white elephant would be the most suitable logo for this scheme.
The developer Holbeck Land is proposing to build a large convenience store in
The developer Holbeck Land is proposing to build a large convenience store in the Headingley, Hyde Park and Woodhouse Moor Conservation Area. The store would be located on the south side of Victoria Road immediately adjacent to 63 Victoria Road. 63 Victoria Road was formerly known as Ash Grove Villa and is a listed building dating back to the first half of the 19th century. Ash Grove Villa is pictured below.
The developer Holbeck Land is proposing to build a large convenience store in
The developer Holbeck Land is proposing to build a large convenience store in
You can object to this application either by submitting a comment via this link, or by sending an email to : planning@leeds.gov.uk, or by writing to the Development Enquiry Centre, The Leonardo Building, 2 Rossington St, Leeds, LS2 8HD. If you send an email, please be sure to include your postal address.
The heads of the five local primary schools all want the swimming pool and
The heads of the five local primary schools all want the swimming pool and sports hall on the Chestnut Avenue site to be acquired for the use of their children:
ting was held
This evening’s meeting was held at the Cardigan Centre. It was attended by four representatives of the developer; Ian Barraclough, John Barraclough, Stuart Natkus, and Matthew Fuller; five councillors; John Illingworth, Janette Walker, Neil Walshaw, Martin Hamilton and Javaid Akhtar; the community planning officer, Ryan Platten and forty one local residents.
Martin Oxley from Futsal came and spoke about how given the chance he could make the site available for the community to use for sports purposes. He said there is plenty of money out there in the form of grants. He said he’s done it before and can do it again.
Amit Roy said the School hadn’t just moved the goalposts, it had moved the entire playing field. He compared the School to locusts, determined to consume everything in our area, and to leave nothing behind.
Mavis Whitbread pointed out that there was an article in today’s paper about how people at Holt Park are complaining that they’ll be without a leisure centre for 11 months while a new multi million pound leisure centre is built to replace their old one, whereas the people of Hyde Park have never had a leisure centre, and now the only swimming pool and sports centre in the area will be pulled down if the current planning application goes ahead.
Councillor Illingworth said that life expectancy in the Holt Park area is 11 to 12 years longer than life expectancy in the Hyde Park area.
Another lady said that whereas the developers claim their development will attract families to the area, the reality is that by building on Hyde Park’s last remaining green space, existing families will be driven from the area.
In response to a promise by Ian Barraclough to include an orchard in the development, Christine McQuillan said her grandchildren don’t need an orchard to sit in and get fat, they need a swimming pool.
It was pointed out from the floor that the swimming pool and sports hall are protected from demolition by a planning law which says that before land with existing sports facilities can be built on, those facilities have to be replaced elsewhere, and the School hasn’t replaced the swimming pool and sports hall with new ones either at Alwoodley or anywhere else. Councillor Hamilton said he would look into this.
At the end of the meeting, residents voted to reject the current planning application, and to establish an action group whose aim will be to ensure that the site remains as a playing field and that the swimming pool and sports hall are made available for use by the community.
