The Environment Agency has updated its on line maps which show flood risks across the country.
In the west of York – away from the rivers and becks – there is generally a low flood risk. However surface water, which hasn’t been able to drain away, can still be a problem
Click on the map below to see how you home might be affected.
click to visit site
York Council officials have now given a preview of their plans for the redevelopment of the Lowfields school site (above).
The scheme – called “Lowfield Green” (sic) – includes the “provision of a care home, age related housing including bungalows, a health and police centre, family housing, plots for self-build and public open space”.
The scheme still involves building on the sports pitches but officials claim they wish to retain the mature trees on the site and provide a “pocket park and allotments“.
The Council plans to relocate the football provision to a site off of Tadcaster Road, in partnership with Woodthorpe Wanderers. This will allow them to have fenced off pitches which help with the “player environment”.
Residents are invited to two drop-in sessions with council officers who will explain the plans and answer questions. The drop-in sessions will take place on Wednesday 12 October and Tuesday 18 October between 4.30pm and 7.30pm at the Oak room, Gateway Community Church on Front Street. The plans will also be on display at Acomb Explore Library Learning Centre from Wednesday 12 October for 3 weeks where residents will be able to feedback.
Alternatively residents can have their say by emailing lowfield.development@york.gov.uk or see www.york.gov.uk/consultations.
Even a casual glance to the proposals confirms that they represent a gross over-development of the site. Fundamental mistakes include the provision of a through road from Dijon Avenue to Tudor Road (previous plans had indicate access from two cul de sacs to minimise short cutting).
The plans include two big traffic generators.
One is the GP surgery which is to be transferred from its present location on Cornlands Road. While there are bus stops within 100 metres of the Cornlands Road site the nearest equivalent public transport point to Lowfields is about 1/4 mile away on Front Street (although a one direction service does serve Tudor Road). This means that most who attend the surgery will drive to the site.
Another big traffic generator would be the proposed Police depot. The Police intend to close their Acomb Road station and relocate vehicle parking, messing and briefing facilities. There are no plans to provide a manned police reporting desk (either here or at the Acomb Library which is the location favoured by the majority of local residents). However 24/7 vehicular access will be required.
Taken together the Surgery and Police depot will have a major impact on traffic levels and parking problems in what is currently a quiet residential area.
Although putting starter homes near to elderly persons accommodation may seem attractive to some, history suggests that the differing lifestyles of the two age groups are rarely compatible,. We think that the site should be reserved for older residents who could be encouraged to “downsize” from their exiting larger houses, freeing them for family use
All in all these are very disappointing proposals.
The Council has not yet even responded to the public consultation comments submitted a couple of months ago when the Draft Local Plan revealed that the number of homes planned for Lowfields had more than doubled.
The Council should let that process conclude before tabling new plans.
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EARLIER – Residents have criticised the York Council for not updating them about the future of the Lowfields school site.
Many returned comment forms when a Local Plan consultation took place in Acomb 2 months ago. No one has received any feedback.
Residents had also been told in the summer that a further consultation event would be held during October but so far the Council have not confirmed that this will actually take place.
Residents completing a survey form had criticised the Council plans which would see building on the school playing fields. This was a direct contravention of assurances given when the school closed over 6 years ago and flies in the face of national government policy on the retention of sports pitches and facilities.
Latest residents survey results
Residents want to see the site used predominantly to provide accommodation aimed at older age groups. They have been particularly concerned about proposals to move police vehicle garaging & messing facilities from the present York Road site into the area. They fear that 24/7 access will exacerbate, already difficult, traffic and parking issues in the small estate.
Two weeks ago the NHS said that it had discounted the site as a possible location for a new mental health hospital
The Council is next scheduled to discuss the Lowfields plans at a meeting taking place on 8th December.
Cllr Sue Hunter visited St Leonard’s Hospice who had an open day last week
Good news as Community Payback teams have got round to painting some of the cycle barriers in the area. This one is in Teal Drive
Unfortunately an outbreak of anti social bahaviour on Acomb Moor left bemused occupants eyeing a burnt out scooter. We’ve asked for the scooter to be removed.
A new Foxwood area Focus was published. Focus has been a feature of life in west York for over 40 years now. In 1976 the main issues included a plan for major changes to road layouts on Gale Lane which had a poor accident record. The “St Stephens” tip was also to be levelled. Several years later an elderly persons home was built on the reclaimed site.
Andrew and Sue unveiled the first of 6 new litter bins which will be installed in the Westfield area. This bin is at the junction of Gale Lane and Askham Lane
The week ended with a Craft Fair at Acomb Explore library
With the York Council showing little inclination or ability to bring several major change projects to a conclusion (Guildhall, York Central, Community Stadium, ring road improvements etc.), you would think that the last thing they would want to do is add another project to a growing list.
It seems not, as the “Executive” is set on reopening the debate about whether to hive off its Council Housing activities. It is little more than a decade since tenants rejected the idea of having their tenancies transferred to either a Housing Association or quasi-independent “arm’s length company”.
It’s not as though the Council’s decision to outsource activities like econ
omic 
development/tourism/markets has been an outstanding success. The bodies are largely self-serving and unaccountable (while still sucking in large amounts of public money).
It seems that Tories in the city want to rid themselves of Council housing responsibilities in the wake of the central government decision to reduce rent levels by 1% a year until 2019 (an attempt to reduce the cost of rent rebates). This could eat into the £3 million+ a year surplus that the York housing account currently makes.
Confusion also surrounds the government’s plan to force Council’s to sell vacant “higher value” Council houses on the open market, to help to subsidise the sale of housing association properties to their tenants.
The effects of both these policies are far from clear. It is at least possible that social housing sales to sitting tenants will be very low even with the substantial discounts.
Council house management in York is far from perfect. We have often criticised the maintenance regime on communal areas and garage blocks. But that requires a change in management attitudes. It does not suggest a change in ownership and with it a loss of democratic accountability.
Spending £200,000 on employing consultants to engineer change is both profligate and premature. It won’t produce a single extra affordable rent property in the City.
The effects of government policy will be clearer in a couple of years’ time. The Council should concentrate its limited resources on other more pressing issues in the meantime.
Foxwood Lane shops
The petitions had pointed at poor maintenance standards, with weeds and litter a constant problem.
The main criticism though was about the surface of the roads and footpaths some of which are badly rutted and uneven.
A meeting on the 13th October will hear that highways officials have examined the roads and paths in both areas and have ordered that potholes be filled in on sections which are a part of the adopted public highway.
Officials say that they have limited powers to require the owners of the private shop forecourts to undertake safety work.
They report that they have “undertaken additional inspections following receipt of the petitions and have identified any areas where the condition of the footway is approaching or exceeding intervention levels, works have been programmed and delivered where these have been identified within the adopted highway. Letters requesting works from frontagers have been issued to address any similar areas within the unadopted areas”.
Front Street
Regeneration needed
The report goes on to say that any further uplift works must form part of a larger regeneration project. They recommend that this option be referred to the responsible Executive member with a further report.
However, they also say that
“further improvements will require significant works to reinvigorate the two areas, initial estimates could be in the region of £500,000 for Acomb Front Street and £125,000 for Foxwood.
Additional complications arise with both locations where an additional financial burden would fall to the frontagers who would be expected to contribute significant sums of a similar magnitude to facilitate improvements of the adopted and unadopted areas”.
While we have long believed that a major investment is needed to regenerate the large, complex and neglected Front Street area, the suggestion that £1/4 million needs to be spent resurfacing the Foxwood shops forecourts is ridiculous.
What is needed is an overlay of flexible surfacing – similar perhaps to that used by the Council in Library Square – plus repainting or renewal of street furniture such as the cycle rack and bins.
We hope that Councillors won’t be hoodwinked by this very obvious example of “shroud waving”.
Below is the latest planning application received by the York Council for the Westfield ward.
Full details can be found by clicking the words highlighted in blue
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Acomb Wood Drive payphone
Telephone Kiosk Opposite Acomb Wood Shopping Centre Acomb Wood Drive York
Proposal Removal of public payphone
Reference 16/02147/TCNOT
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Representations can be made in favour of, or in objection to, any application via the Planning on line web site. http://planningaccess.york.gov.uk/online-applications/
The Council now no longer routinely consults neighbours by letter when an application is received
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In the main, business rates will increase in London and the south east.
The proposed new rate levels in the north of England are, at worst, steady but some areas – including Scarborough – are set to see reductions.
There were hopes that sub-urban shopping areas in York might benefit from lower rates but this has yet to be confirmed.
In Acomb, some long term empty properties do get a rates discount when brought back into use.
The York Council has so far made no comment on the new valuation lists which it received last week.
All UK firms pay a tax on the shops, offices, warehouses and factories that they use. All businesses with properties that have a rateable value over £12,000 have to pay Rates. They are the third biggest outgoing for many small businesses after rent and staff costs.
Empty commercial properties brought back into use in Front Street are entitled to a Business Rates discount
Every five years the underlying value of properties is assessed to determine their “rateable value”.
That figure broadly represents the yearly rent – the rentable value – for which the property could be let. The revaluation published yesterday, is based on rentable values on 1 April 2015 and comes into effect on 1 April 2017
The rateable value is then combined with the “multiplier” – a figure set by the government each year – to determine the final bill.
When Business Rates are revalued the government provides a transitional arrangement, to help companies adapt. The transitional arrangement will limit the amount that bills will go up each year, offering a financial cushion that, in the first year, will apply to over 600,000 properties, according to the government.
At the moment, English authorities keep hold of 50% of locally-collected Business Rates. The other half goes into a central government pool and is redistributed back to the local authorities according to need.
The government is working towards allowing local authorities to keep 100% of business rates (with a proportionate reduction in other grants).
