Worries Harrogate traffic works will cause gridlock

Delays are expected for some weeks as work shortly gets underway on the scheme, which will see improvements to a key junction, on Leeds Road, Harrogate, as part of work for a new Marks & Spencer Simply Food store.

The chief executive of the Harrogate Chamber of Trade and Commerce, Brian Dunsby, said yesterday that he was pleased that following discussions one lane was to remain open but confirmed his organisation would be monitoring the impact.

He said: “This major radial route into and out of Harrogate is very sensitive to any obstruction or ill-timed traffic lights and pedestrian crossings.

“As I have said many times, Harrogate’s economy depends primarily on visitors of all types and sizes - so we really must do everything possible to maximise the flow of inbound and outbound traffic on the major radial roads into and out of the town centre.”

He added the lengths of queues on the A61 inbound every morning and outbound every evening are a serious issue that “discourages our visitors, delays buses and commercial vehicles and generally gives Harrogate a bad name for traffic congestion”.

Last year it was announced that a drive was underway to boost tourism numbers in the spa town by capitalising on the multi-million pound conferencing trade and using the opening stages of this year’s Tour de France to showcase the region to an international audience.

Tourism chiefs met last year to officially launch Visit Harrogate, to promote the town and surrounding district and mirror the success of similar bodies such as Visit York. Tourism in the Harrogate area already supports about 23,000 jobs and is worth £680m to the local economy.

Yesterday it was revealed that work is due to begin on January 27 on the most complex part of the highways works to improve the Leeds Road/Hookstone Road junction, required by North Yorkshire County Council, as part of planning permission terms for a new M&S Simply Food store at the junction. It is being co-ordinated with highways work planned ahead of July’s Grand Depart of the Tour de France in Harrogate.

The works will involve the closure of lanes on Leeds Road and temporary changes to traffic signal priorities at the junction. Work will last several weeks and is scheduled to last into April.

The site’s developers, St James Securities, and contractors GMI Construction Group and HACS, said it had worked with the county council’s highways department and aimed to carry out the necessary works as quickly as possible.

St James Securities construction director, Dan Murray, said: “We have looked at a number of options with the Highways Department to try to find the safest way to carry out the required works on what is one of the busiest approach roads to Harrogate.

“There has been consultation with local councillors, the Chamber of Trade and Commerce and the bus operator, Transdev, to establish how best to proceed.

“The required works include new ducts under the full width of Leeds Road, as well as a new pedestrian crossing island, traffic lights and resurfacing. We are aware that these works will cause disruption and delays and we wanted to give drivers as much advance notice as possible.”

The contractors and the utility companies have worked with the county council to provide a junction that can accommodate predicted future traffic growth.

St James Securities said that as work progresses the arrangement of the lanes, both in-bound and out-bound, will be altered from time to time to allow safe working. One lane in each direction will be kept open at all times.

Traffic light priorities will be altered during the works so that the Hookstone Road and Leadhall Lane operate independently of each other, although these will revert back to normal once work is complete.

County Councillor David Simister, a Ukip councillor for the Harrogate Bilton and Nidd Gorge division, said he believed problems on the route stemmed back to changes to road markings made in the road last year.

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