York to get Ultra-Fast Broadband

Broadband

The news that Sky/TalkTalk are to launch an ultrafast broadband service in the City, possibly as early as next year, is welcome.

The high speeds on offer will be a boon to businesses in the City particularly those in the technology reliant sectors.

It may also provide a boost for “home workers”.

The City has many broadband providers but the domestic market is dominated by the BT network and Virgin.

Virgin in particular provides a high speed service – shortly to increase to 150 mps in some areas – which most leisure/domestic users will find adequate. It comes at a price though.

Competition is generally good for the consumer.

There may, however, be some downsides.

Unless the new network provider – CityFibre – can utilise existing utility ducts, we could be in for another period of damaged footpaths. NTL (Virgins predecessor) didn’t win many friends as it ploughed up the City’s streets nearly 20 years ago.

And pricing will be important. Commercial users will take a hardnosed approach.

Residents living in the suburbs and villages around York may, however, find that the market simply couldn’t fund the new infrastructure at this point in time.

We will see.

In the meantime the Council Leadership is promising “citywide” coverage.

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“Free” car parking in York

Since 2012 Labour has increased car parking charges by as much as 80%.

It has been an open secret that businesses in the City centre hoped to extract major concessions on car parking charges when the new John Lewis development opened at Monks Cross.

Castle short stay car park

Castle short stay car park

Even so, today’s Council announcement that there would be “free” car parking at many City centre car parks between 8:00am and 11:00am on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays comes as a surprise.

Nothing is “free”. The loss of income – which would eventually fall on taxpayers – could be as much as £500,000 pa.

Dumping more traffic onto the highways network at the busiest time of the week (between 8:00am and 9:30am) could have far reaching consequences for traffic congestion.

The selected times are also those when deliveries are being made in the footstreets area

Park and Ride passenger numbers are likely to suffer, while many shoppers and short term visitors may well choose to do their business in the 3 hour “free” period, leaving car parks empty at other times of the day.

The Council isn’t even in a position to make such an announcement.

No Councillor or officer has that delegated power (just as the “Labour Group” had no constitutional power to remove the restrictions on Lendal Bridge).

But the Councils constitution and delegation schemes have been thrown out of the window in the last few weeks.

A report indicating the consequences of the proposal must go to the “Cabinet” meeting which is taking place on 6th May

Taxpayers, bus users (who would be delayed by added congestion) and rival car park operators will look with interest at the assumptions being made. The private operators in particular may regard the Councils plan as unfair trading given that the subsidy will apparently come from Section 106 monies derived for the Vanguard development.

With the Council heavily dependant on the £5 million that it receives from off street parking charges, the unanswered question is what happens when the Vanguard subsidy runs out?

A more flexible approach to charging levels is needed and new technologies make this possible.

However, like the Lendal Bridge trial, the plan has all the hallmarks of a badly thought through scheme.

Visitors who arrive back at their vehicles at 11:30am, and find that they have been fined for failing to “pay and display”, are unlikely to be very happy.

The safest option would have been to reduce the charges at off peak times and focus further discounts at identified “shopper’s car parks” such as Fossbank.

The Council should also get on with resurfacing the Castle car park (safety issue) and making sure that the “parking space availability” real time information is once again provided on both their web site and on the variable message boards located on arterial roads.

NB. The Council appear to have missed the irony of issuing, with their media announcement, a photograph of Councillors striding through an already full car park.

Chaloners Road development exhibition on Wednesday

Chaloners Road garages

Chaloners Road garages

A Public Information Drop-In Event has been organised for those interested in the plans for new Council flats on Chaloners Road and Newbury Avenue.

The Council has still to confirm how it will deal with the extra car parking requirements generated by the vehicles displaced from the site.

The “drop in” takes place on

Wednesday 16th April between 4pm – 7pm

at the York and district Indoor Bowls Club, Thanet Road, YO24 2NW

Solar farm planned for Knapton Moor

Solar Farm site click to enlarge

Solar Farm site click to enlarge

1.8 hectares of land off Wetherby Road (Site 772) could be turned into a solar farm.  The area of land is located near to Harewood Whin.

The Council report indicates what criteria have to be met by these farms which generate electricity from solar panels (similar in principle to those now found on many household roofs).

They are not as controversial as wind farms, being silent and relatively unobtrusive. Security at the sites is high though.

Similar sites are planned for Malton Road and Towthorpe

Housing building sites – more information released

Moor Lane developers option - click to enlarge

Moor Lane developers option – click to enlarge

The York Council has released more details of the assessments that it has made of requests by landowners for particular sites to be considered for development.

They include assessments for some sites, which were rejected, and are not being considered at its meetings on the 17th April  and 23rd April 2014

Council officials have reviewed development boundaries at several sites put forward last year.

Council officials have agree to reduce the area of land available for house building to the rear of St Leonards Hospice (site 247). This is aimed a preserving the views for patients. However officers continue to endorse building on the farm land to the rear of The Square. The housing site further down Tadcaster Road site 696) at the stables will not be increased in size.

Hospice/The Square site. Click to enlarge

Hospice/The Square site. Click to enlarge

A proposal by developers to more than double the size of the Moor Lane site (ref ST10) – itself highly controversial – has also been rejected by officials

They are relevant though in so far as they provide an indication of the landowner’s development aspirations. They are likely to reappear at the Public Inquiry later in the year when owners will try to have additional development land added to the Plan.

39 sites, including one off Askham Lane, were rejected because they failed to respect the natural environment; two were rejected because they were on open space, while 21 had poor transport links and/or access to services

Stables housing site on Tadcaster Road

Stables housing site on Tadcaster Road

The proposals included the land (site ref 220) on Wetherby Road – near Knapton – originally suggested as a “Showman’s Yard” site. Now the owners want to build housing there. Worryingly the reason given by the Council officials for opposing development is the “lack of public transport”. No mention is made of its green belt credentials.

26 sites failed a “technical evaluation”. These included land to the west of Chapelfields (ref 778) which was rejected on grounds of landscape value and potential archaeology.

Askham Bryan transhipment depot plan. Click to enlarge

Askham Bryan transhipment depot plan. Click to enlarge

There is a similar list of changes to sites proposed for Employment/Retail use.

These include a “freight transhipment” and Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) site on land between the A1237 and Askham Bryan. Although currently well screened by trees, this is an elevated site which would be visible from several miles.

Officials also rule out the development of even more of the open space between Woodthorpe, Foxwood, Chapelfields and the ring roads (site 791) and the rest of Acomb Moor (site 792) although the partial development of the moor still remains part of the draft Plan.

959 housing sites missed from draft Local Plan

Green Belt campaign logo

Nearly two thirds, of the homes granted planning permission since Labours draft Local Plan was drawn up, have been for sites omitted from the Plan.

A total of 1831 new sites for homes have been agreed since October 2012.

This is in addition to the 3231 sites which already had planning permission.

That means developers could now erect 5062 homes in the City – a 6 year supply of land, based on average house building rates over the last decade.

Of the total new permissions granted, 1678 were for brownfield sites. The vast majority – including the former Press offices in Walmgate – were not identified for residential use when the draft Local Plan was published 12 months ago.

The Council’s plans continue to under-estimate the supply of brownfield land. The plan should identify any site – of more that 0.2 ha in size – with potential for housing. The draft Plan failed to do so. The additional sites which will be considered on 17th April also fail to do so. The Council has said that it does not know how many additional homes could be accommodated on the new sites due to be considered on 17th April.

It is an important issue as the Council has not made any allowance for “windfall” sites in its calculation of the total build requirement for the next 15 years.

Nor has it identified the potential for conversion of existing commercial property with some very large opportunities – such as Ryedale House, Stonebow and Hillary House – excluded from the calculations.

Promised conversions, of the upper floors of shopping premises, have also been excluded.

A full list of the permissions granted can be downloaded from here

The figures are likely to be of considerable significance when the Local Plan reaches the Examination in Public Inquiry stage.

The make up of the Draft local Plan base numbers is as follows:

The Local Plan Preferred Options was based on a position at 1st October 2012. The total number of residential net outstanding consents (commitments) at that date was 3,231 dwellings. This is detailed in Chapter 10 of the LPPO document (Housing Growth and Distribution). The table below splits this figure into site categories.

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New signposts could cost £200,000!

Signpost in York

Further to yesterdays story, we are told that the new signposts, planned for the City centre, could cost £200,000.

The plan has been disguised in the Councils published budget as a “wayfinding” project.

Pedestrian signs are less important these days as more and more visitors rely on mobile phone “apps” to find their way around the City.

Liberal Democrat Councillor Keith Aspden comments;

“With frontline services being cut and council tax going up residents will be shocked that Labour is choosing to spend £200,000 on a report into signposts in the city-centre.

The lessons from Lendal Bridge and Kings Square are clearly not being learnt.

Labour need to cut the vanity projects and focus spending on things that actually matter to local residents.”