City of York Council will be carrying out clearance works, from this week, in the area surrounding the A59 and Tadcaster Road to prepare for the new Park & Ride sites at Poppleton Bar and Askham Bar.
The council will be clearing vegetation in and around the A59/A1237, the A59/Station Road junctions and A64 Slip Road/Tadcaster Road junction to prepare for one of the largest single investments in York’s transport infrastructure.

The works will take place over the next two weeks, and weather permitting, aim to be completed by week ending Friday 8 February. The clearance work has been timed so that nesting birds will not be affected by the main construction works.

Whilst the loss of vegetation is necessary to progress the project, there are proposals for extensive new landscaped areas to replace this. Clearance will only be of vegetation within the highway boundary or on council owned land and vegetation chippings will be reused as a mulch.

The contractor for the works is the council’s Public Realm department. The majority of the works will be undertaken off road and so disruption to road users will be minimised, with any work adjacent to heavily used roads only undertaken at off-peak times.

Traffic management will be place on the edge of the A1237 during off peak hours between 9am and 3pm only. The approaches to the A59/A1237 roundabout will be coned down to one lane only to slow traffic and protect the workforce.

On Tuesday 8 January Cabinet approved the delivery of these advance works and submission of the Full Approval Application to the Department for Transport (DfT).

Subject to full approval being received from the DfT, main construction works will commence from March 2013, with estimated completion for April 2014.

Phase 1 of the project will enhance York’s Park & Ride network, which already provides over four-million journeys every year, by replacing the Askham Bar Park & Ride site with a larger facility and creating a new site on the A59 near Poppleton.