A meeting on Thursday will be told that the York Council invested only £4.5 million of its £6.8 million transport budget during the last financial year.

This represents the worst percentage outturn performance for over a decade and will be a major embarrassment to a Council which is currently seeking additional transport funding to address congestion concerns on the A1237 and elsewhere in the City.

The credibility of the Labour Council’s “priority programme” Get York Moving has also been damaged by the performance.

Most of the shortfall came on projects to provide new park and ride sites and improve bus services in the City.

It means that the completion date for these schemes will slip by at least 12 months.

£395,000 was budgeted to be spent on schemes aimed at improving road safety. Only £202,000 of the budget was spent. Most of it went on a 20 mph speed limit scheme in the Bishopthorpe Road area.

On parking, the report says that “implementation of the ‘pay on exit’ car parking scheme at Marygate car park was delayed as the scheme that was initially proposed (using ANPR cameras) could not be progressed due to recent changes in legislation. It is now proposed to install barriers and new ticket machines at Marygate car park to replace the existing ‘pay and display’ system in 2013/14, which should be operational in late 2013”.

The scheme will cost £100,000 to implement amidst concerns that maintenance of the equipment could cost more than any additional revenue generated by the system

NB. The Council recently had to admit that its plans to provide new homes for the elderly were also running 3 years behind schedule.