York Local Plan – confusion grows

No sooner had the agenda for York’s Council meeting – to be held next Thursday – been published, than meetings to discuss the Local Plan have appeared in the Council’s diary of events.

The Council agenda had included several questions critical of the delays, and lack of clear milestones, in the preparation of the Local Plan

Yesterday we reported that the Forward Programme of decisions – a legal requirement for all major issues – did not include any reference to an update of the Local Plan.

Residents protest against Local Plan

Residents protest against Local Plan

So far, residents have not even had an opportunity to speak out about Labour’s plan – announced a year ago – to increase the size of the City.

Now a mysterious “special” meeting of the Councils “Cabinet” has been scheduled for Wednesday 23rd April. The Councils web site has been amended today to say that;

“During the consultation additional information on sites was submitted by landowners and developers.  Before making any final decision on sites to be included in the Local Plan, the Council would like to understand the public views on this additional information. Reports relating to this will be considered at the Local Plan Working Group and a special cabinet in late April and this will be followed by public consultation”.

Whether landowner’s comments will do anything to reassure residents about the Councils expansion plans remains to be seen.

The Council has still not published the 4000+ objections made by residents to the original plan.

Any new information is due to be considered by the (all party)  “Local Plan Working Group”, a meeting of which has now been scheduled for Tuesday 22nd April. As this is the day before the Cabinet meeting, it is unlikely that the working groups views – much less any views expressed by residents – would be reported to a meeting which is taking place the next day.

Legally the Cabinet cannot take any decisions on “key” matters – like the Local Plan – without giving 4 months notice in their Forward Programme.

They have still not published a timetable of milestone dates which will lead up to the inevitable Public Inquiry into their plans, which is now unlikely to take place before next year.

Rubbish skips this weekend Saturday 22nd March

Although the Council has cut back on the number of amenity skips it provides, several residents associations continue to run programmes aimed at making it easier for tenants to get rid of unwanted items.

The skips are only in place for a few minutes and residents must ensure that they put any rubbish into the skips and do not leave it on the path or highway.

1 Cambridge St 08:30 09:30
3 Woodlea Ave 12:30 13:30

80% of Lendal Bridge fines issued to visitors

A freedom of information response from the York Council has revealed that the vast majority of fines issued to drivers using Lendal Bridge are to vehicles registered outside the York area.

Lendal Bridge signs

Around 80% of the PCNs issued arrive on visitors doormats.

As hinted at by some correspondents on this web site, the Council has been unable to sustain the fines if appeals are lodged and then pursued as far as a tribunal.

11,578 (24%) of PCNs issued have attracted appeals

The Council says that 8087 (17%) of PCNs “have been cancelled following representations and for other reasons”.

The figures confirm that the signage used to indicate the restrictions on bridge access are hopelessly inadequate.

They will help to underpin the motion to next weeks York Council meeting from Cllr Ann Reid who will ask for the ANPR cameras to be switched off immediately.

The full motion reads:
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Child health in York better than average.

Public Health England have released Child Health Profiles for City of York Council, which provide a snapshot of child health in the city.

The key findings from the report show that the health and wellbeing of children in York is generally better than the England average and that children and young people under the age of 20 make up 21.7% of the city’s population.

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‘Gold box’ for York’s Archives

gold box minster web 2A giant ‘gold box’ to house the City of York’s most precious historic documents will be craned into place at York Explore this week.

The new state-of-the-art vault will be home to 800 years of the city’s history and is part of the £1.6m Heritage Lottery Fund-supported Gateway to History project to preserve and open up York’s internationally-important archives to people across the city – and across the world. Thousands of books, manuscripts and maps will be safely stored on nearly a mile of shelves in the climate-controlled box.

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Park & Pedal initiative commended at national awards

City of York Council’s Park & Pedal scheme, which was the first of its kind in the UK, has been commended at the 2014 British Parking Awards in the cycle parking category.

The scheme which was launched eleven months ago in partnership with McArthurGlen York Designer Outlet, TSYS (Total System Services Inc) and First Bus Park & Ride, aims to encourage commuters to park their cars free of charge at the Park and Ride and use their cycles to ride into York.

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Lendal Bridge – more stats creep out. Transport boss heads for Orkney

Lendal Bridge

Lendal Bridge

Following yesterdays Lendal Bridge story – in which we revealed that the York Council had failed to live up to its promise to publish monthly monitoring reports – the statistics for period 6 (February) have now appeared on their web site.

A total of 53,605 drivers had been fined for crossing Lendal Bridge during restricted hours by the end of February.

In addition 15,907 fines had been issued on Coppergate.

The full figures can be downloaded from here

Meanwhile other monitoring data can be found by clicking here.

Most Park and Ride journeys are taking longer with the number 2 service for Rawcliffe via Leeman Road the worst affected showing an increase in journey time of around 2 minutes.

Traffic volumes are up on Clifton Bridge, Foss Islands Road, Shipton Road and Malton Road.

Not surprisingly, Clifton Bridge is worst affected (+167 vehicle movements)

Meanwhile the media are reporting that Daren Richardson, who has been the Director of Planning and Transport for the York Council for the last 18 months, is quitting the City and heading for Orkney.

It is unclear whether he hopes to take any of York’s bridges with him!

York jobseekers figures released

Figures released today by the Office for National Statistics have shown a 28.3% fall in the number of people claiming Job Seekers Allowance in York, since February 2013.

Today’s statistics have shown an increase of 47 people claiming Job Seekers Allowance compared to last month’s figures meaning there are now 2230 claimants in the city, the lowest February figure since February 2008.

The claimant count represents 1.7% of the working population and stands less than half the regional average of 3.9%. The figures are also much lower than the national average, which stands at 3.0%. However.

Today’s figures also revealed a 45.5% decrease in the number of 18-24 year olds, claiming over one year. The statistics showed a decrease of 10 people claiming JSA from last month, meaning there are now 60 claiming, 50 less than one year ago.

The results also showed the number of claimants out of work for over one year has decreased by 20 from last month, totalling 500, this represents a 24.2% decrease of 160 from one year ago.

Youth unemployment was also shown to have decreased 35.7% since February 2013.

Vince Cable

Vince Cable MP

Figures published today by the Office for National Statistics show that the level of unemployment has fallen again nationally.

Unemployment figures have fallen by 63,000 to 2.33 million in the three months to January 2014. The number of people in employment has risen to 30.19 million.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, Vince Cable said:

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