Wishful thinking

Northallerton are the responsibility of North Yorkshire County Council as the highway authority to meet the cost of sorting out.

The £6m grant towards the North Northallerton link road is from the Local Enterprise Partnership, in this instance York, North Yorkshire and East Riding LEP.

Cllr John Weighell, Leader of the county council is a member of this LEP, as the government delegates grant making decisions to the Local Grant Making Authority.

As far as I understand it, local authorities cannot use this funding for their own work. Specifically “It is important to note that it is the Government’s expectation that accountable bodies cannot use this funding for their own purposes.”

So the LEP should not use such funding to solve the problems of Low Gates railway crossing. If the link road solves the traffic problems caused by Low Gates railway crossings that would be an inappropriate use of LEP funding. The reason why it is not illegal is because it does not solve the traffic problems caused by Low Gates railway crossing.

There may actually be marginal benefits if the link road is completed before the development starts but this will be quickly eroded to zero as the development proceeds. The purpose of the link road is to mitigate the negative effects of the additional traffic caused by the development itself. Anything else is only wishful thinking.

ALAN McKEE

Brompton, Northallerton.