Following an accident on the A64 just south of York the eastbound carriageway was closed for a time.
Alternative routes, including Tadcaster Road and the A1237, were heavily congested.
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The Cabinet member with responsibility for Transport (now Cllr Levene following Dave Merretts sacking last week) will be asked on Monday to sort out the continuing Lendal Bridge refund crisis.
Although no background report has yet been published, it seems likely that the first step will be to scrap the 31st December deadline for the Council to receive refund requests.
Quite how the Council will “automatically” refund the remaining fines remains to be seen as does the result of the Council’s appeal against similar unlawful charges which were levied in Coppergate.
It looks like Labour Councillors want to spend another £1/4 million on a 3 day cycling event next May. One of the stages of the new “Tour de Yorkshire” will finish in York with several local sprint races planned.
Taxpayers will be expected to pick up the bill, from the commercial rights owners, for a whopping £100,000 “hosting fee” for the event,.
A report which is being considered tomorrow, by the Councils Cabinet, shows no sponsorship or admittance fees aimed at offsetting the bills.
A decision will apparently be made before the Inquiry into the disastrous Grand Departy flop is completed.
Organisers were forced to admit a couple of months ago that the Huntington Stadium event – staged separately from the Tour de France start – had lost over £186,000. An inquiry into the event was subsequently ordered by the Council’s scrutiny committee.
The same Council Cabinet agenda talks of major cuts to basic service standards.
Road surfaces in Queenswood Grove already breaking up
£1.3 million a year will be cut from social care budgets.
As well as the much publicised proposals to charge for green bin emptying and move to 4 weekly residual waste collections, Labour are now admitting that more cuts are planned to open space maintenance.
Volunteers will apparently be expected to maintain bowling greens, tennis courts, flower beds and undertake rose planting. The report says that the “replacement of bedding plants with ornamental grass at 18 sites could potentially save 1,519 hours of labour”.
Ominously the report talks of York’s roads and footpaths being “better than average” suggesting that further cuts in maintenance standards are planned.
Many residents will view with incredulity any proposals which would allow a further deterioration in the standard of highways surfaces.
The proposal was tabled by Liberal Democrat Leader Keith Aspden
It is of course a decision which should have been taken in September 2013 when it became clear that the trial had failed.
15 months later it will be too late for some.
Those who have in the interim died, those who have moved home, those who have changed bank accounts as well as many who live abroad, may even now not find the fines are as easy to obtain as many would hope.
However it is an end to part of the saga with any inquiry, into the irregularities that took place, likely now to have to wait until after the elections in May.
Attention will now turn to the appeal relating to the imposition of fines for the extended hours restrictions on Coppergate.
If that appeal by the Council, against the traffic adjudicator ruling, fails then the repercussions for taxpayers and/or local service standards could be considerable.
Coppergate – York Council failure, to win appeal against unlawful fines issue, could plunge it into a financial crisis
Other areas of concern identified in the report include
A separate report identifies problems with the Councils capital investment programme.
Failure to move ahead with the reuse of the Guildhall means that £350,000 of “critical” repairs will now be needed.
And a major problem is arising with the Councils existing Elderly Persons Homes. These were supposed to have closed by now having been replaced by the new care village at Lowfields. But that project is 3 years behind schedule and the existing buildings will need to be patched up at a cost of £500,000!
Click to enlarge
The carriageway programme can be seen by clicking here The footpath programme can be viewed here
Alternatively click on the graphic right to see a ward by ward analysis.
Not a lot of work is scheduled for the west of the city although the bulk of the programme will not be revealed until the Council has completed its budget for next year in February. The current £2 million programme would normally be supplemented by another £4 million worth of schemes when the dust has settled.
Nevertheless there are some worrying omissions.
In the Westfield ward only a tiny footpath resurfacing scheme in Kempton Close is included.
Most residents expect major highways repairs to be necessary on the Kingsway West/Windsor Garth loop following damaged caused by vehicles accessing the new Our Lady’s redevelopment site. There is no sign of such a commitment
Residents living in the terraced area around Gladstone Street will also be disappointed to have been missed from the initial list. The streets are long overdue for resurfacing. They really need to be sorted out as part of a regeneration scheme for the whole of that part of Acomb.
Having already broken the long standing convention that no party political opinions should be published in Council documentation, both the outgoing Leader and Deputy Leader have produced reports which criticise their opponents or seeking to blame the Coalition for all the ills of the world.
So much then for any attempt at making a fresh start or reaching consensus. Some at least want to continue the confrontational approach which was rejected so comprehensively by electors in the October by-election
Overgrown garage area
One report even seeks to blame the government for a reduction in the number of people registered to vote in the City!
More significantly it continues to turn a blind eye to the deteriorating condition of the infrastructure (right) on many Council estates in the City.
Cllr Alexander sadly has written his own epitaph by claiming “Liberal Democrats want no Local Plan or one that would fail Government requirements” In reality, a Local Plan agreed in 2011 which Labour tinkered with and then withdraw.
Liberal Democrats want a Local Plan which respects both the priorities of the City’s population and which seeks to preserve the unique qualities of the City. Labour’s plan to expand the size of the City by over 20% during the next 15 years satisfied neither of the tests.
Failure to produce a Local Plan which could attract the support of both the Council and the people of the City is a poor legacy to leave to your successor.
Two Cabinet members are to be summoned to a meeting on 11th December to decide whether to include the Punch Bowl in on a list of properties subject to an article 4 direction.
A meeting in October rejected the request even though designation would only require any proposed change of use to be subject to a formal planning application.
The Cabinet members for Planning and for Finance are now being asked to remove permitted development rights by CAMRA who are backed by a 1200 signature petition.
Residents will have to wait until early January before finding out which local bus services Labour plan to cut. A decision meeting would have aired the issue was to have taken place on 11th December. 
The issue has now been referred to a Cabinet meeting scheduled for 6th January 2015.
The Council has made it clear that they are not proposing to consult with passengers likely to be affected by any cuts.
Residents, businesses and passengers can find out more about the refurbishment of Scarborough rail bridge (York) this week, as the team behind the work holds an open day.
Scarborough Railway Bridge
On Thursday, 4 December, between 10am and 7pm, at the site offices in Marygate car park, Frederic Street (YO30 7DT), anyone who is interested in the work is encouraged to come along, ask questions and find out more. Attendees can speak to the people running this major project about the plans, the work being undertaken and how long it’s going to take.
The £6m investment is the most significant since the bridge was built in 1875 and, once complete, will mean that the bridge is fit for another 120 years’ service. Work will involve replacing bridge decks, track and installing a new walkway for railway workers. The project is due to complete in April 2015.
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Included is a pledge to “grade separate” the Hopgrove A1237/A64 junction. This means that fly-overs will replace the roundabout (which was itself subject to an £9 million upgrade only 5 years ago).
However, those hoping for the A1237 to be dualled will be disappointed and traffic, at busy times, having avoided the Hopgrove bottleneck, will immediately face continuing congestion on the remainder of the A64 trip to the coast.
Hopes for the A1237 seem to rest on the devolved funding made available to the, increasingly aloof, Leeds based “West Yorkshire Combined Authority”.
Reports last week suggested that funding for larger roundabouts is the extent of their ambitions.
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Last nights episode of the popular BBC Watchdog programme, may have prompted more drivers to apply for a refund of the fines unlawfully imposed when they crossed Lendal bridge in York.
The programme claimed, with the deadline of 31st December 2014 rapidly approaching, that fewer than 10,000, of the 50,0000 drivers affected, had so far applied for refunds.
The Liberal Democrat Group are going to propose at the next Council meeting (on 11th December) that the deadline be extended and that all who paid fines are proactively contacted and advised how to seek a refund.
Some who have applied for a refund have apparently found themselves in a Catch 22 situation with the Council only prepared to refund to the registered keeper. In the case of business, lease or hire cars this has involved the driver in an additional time consuming and expensive administrative loop.
Similarly there remains considerable doubt about how many of the fines issued to foreign tourists have actually been repaid. Given the reputational damage done to the City – and the importance of its tourism industry – we would expect that the Council would already have taken action to reach this group of people.
The underlying cause of the problem, of course, remains the stubborn attitude displayed by some Labour Councillors who, despite the overwhelming evidence that was available by September 2013 that something had gone seriously wrong with the trial, refused to suspend it.
They are relying on the support of the 2 man group of Green Party Councillors to fend off the increasing calls for an inquiry into the mess.
