By one part of the railway museum, looking across towards the other, Leeman Road

Recently we’ve had a quick visit to Cinder Lane, and then to Leeman Road, following the progress of work on the York Central site, where demolition work has started, following approval of the planning applications for the development. As I mentioned previously, there’s been a public inquiry on the proposed ‘stopping up’ (partial closure) of Leeman Road. The inquiry was underway while I was writing the above, and has now finished.

I’m a bit late to all of this, for various reasons, but since I have read more about it I wanted to add a few more notes/thoughts, in this ‘resident’s record of York and its changes’, as it brings together elements of quite a few things I’ve written about many times in the past. But I’m trying to break it up into pages of reasonable length. (They’ll all be tagged YorkCentral.)

York Central, in general

The fact that the site clearance work has started on York Central has been presented as significant progress on this large and complex ‘brownfield’ site. A report prepared for a meeting of the city council’s Executive on 22 April states that ‘the delivery of York Central’ has been a council priority for well over two decades. And that now

York Central has moved from being a long held ambition to a current reality.
– (source (PDF)

It continues:

The enabling works to prepare the site have now commenced. IP1 works are underway to demolish the former Unipart, Freightliner and Concrete Works buildings, site clearance and track lifting ahead of IP2 works to construct the access spine road and Boulevard, add the pedestrian deck to the Severus Bridges, build the access bridge over the East Coast Main Line( ECML) reroute utilities and undertake works to Millennium Green. Despite the challenges we still face with the ongoing Covid 19 pandemic, we are poised to finally deliver on the city’s long held ambition to develop York Central.

That sets it in context. Clearly a huge amount of work has gone into these plans, from so many people, for so long.

A major part of it all is the redevelopment of the railway museum. (Which we used to call the National Railway Museum.)

I have to say that it was clear to me, when walking around with a camera recently, and looking at it more carefully, how a lot of this area around the railway museum could be said to look quite ‘tired’ and dated now. Kind of 1970s meets 19th century with a road through the middle. Though I wouldn’t have thought about it much if it weren’t for the radical plans to change it all, as part of the York Central development.

Vision 2025 – Railway Museum plans

The museum has ambitious plans as it approaches its 50 year anniversary (in 2025). According to its website the museum is

poised to become the cultural anchor—the heartbeat—of the York Central development

To do this it envisages a new Central Hall.

Sensitively and sustainably designed by UK-based architects Feilden Fowles, the building will reference historic locomotive ’roundhouses’. Clad in recycled copper and with high, glazed ceilings with timber radials, the building will be spectacular inside and out, creating a world class-welcome.

Design for Central Hall, Railway Museum, by Feilden Fowles

This isn’t ‘news’, but when it was news, I think many of us may have been distracted by other things. Now I’m paying proper attention, I can see that it’s a splendid-looking thing, References roundhouses and includes recycled copper? Fantastic. Sounds ‘right up my street’, as they say.

But it isn’t literally up my street, and if it was I might have looked at things in a different way. Indeed have been trying to look at things in a different way, in more detail, because the building of this structure means the closure of part of a long-established route.

This new Central Hall

will span the road which dissects the museum

says the railway museum website. I think that should be bisects? – but anyway … when it says ‘span’ it means close part of.

The road was there for quite a while before the museum was, and, as previously mentioned, along it there’s some housing, where quite a few people live, and at the end of it there’s quite a large area of housing, where rather a lot of people live, and not surprisingly, they’re all rather reliant on their route into town, which has been there for quite a long time. Hence the campaign against the closure of the part of Leeman Road the museum wants to acquire for its planned redesign.

I don’t drive, and don’t generally have much reason to travel along the length of Leeman Road, unless I’ve walked up that way to take photos for this website. I’ve been aware of the campaign to oppose the closure. I didn’t really want to spend time on looking into it in further detail, but did, and recognise how many hours the local residents and local councillors must have put into it, to be presenting their case at the public inquiry recently.

As the plan I included on the previous page shows, there is to be a new road through the York Central development, and pedestrian and cycle routes intended to replace the closed part of Leeman Road. Which would mean, eventually, when it’s built, less traffic wending its way through the areas of housing on Leeman Road, as it does now.

It could be said that those who are opposed to it are just ‘resistant to change’, or opposing necessary progress, and that those who have campaigned against it are just thinking of their own interests, and that we should be grateful to have this nationally important/world-class museum in our city and do all we can to accommodate it.

But … this impartial observer, trying to understand the detail, can understand why those who oppose it so strongly have opposed it. The ‘devil’s in the detail’, as they say. I can’t cover all the detail here, but see the previous page for a helpful clear plan showing which part of the road this relates to.

There is apparently to be pedestrian access through the museum when it’s open, intended to replace the direct route that Leeman Road currently takes, but outside of opening hours it means going the long way round. And it seems reasonable to challenge the closure of a long-established right of way.

A recent document (PDF) made available as one of many connected with the public inquiry is a legal agreement on the proposed ‘permissive’ route through the museum grounds. There’s a long list of conditions, (including no spitting … a bit 19th century?), and possibly having to have your bag searched. That’s a bit different from the current open road that we can all at present progress down quite freely.

The issue is now with experts who have listened to the various viewpoints and will make their decision in due course.

Update: 23 Sept 2021

Local media reports today:

Great news – or a huge two-fingers to York? Leeman Road will close, rules Transport Secretary (York Mix)

Grant Shapps gives green light to close Leeman Road in York (York Press)

The post Railway Museum plans and Leeman Road appeared first on York Stories.

Detail of proposed routes around and through the railway museum

I was pleased to find the document above, on this link (ref CD1.7 in the list). I had been a bit confused about what ‘the closure of Leeman Road’ entailed, exactly.

Not the whole of it, clearly. It’s the section denoted by the blue dashes.

It’s still very important — part of the York Central redevelopment — and clearly very controversial, and it’s made me think a lot — not for the first time — about many things connected with the York as we’ve known it and the York it might be becoming.

While I was compiling the recent pages on Cinder Lane and Leeman Road, a public inquiry was underway, on this proposed ‘stopping up’ of the road, as it’s termed.

The inquiry has now finished, but from the documents made available online because of it I was able to find the helpful plan above.

I watched a bit of the livestream of the inquiry, on its final day, and looked at some of the accompanying documents, and wanted to get together on here a bit of information on this. Well, I say ‘wanted to’, I mean I felt like I should. It’s an important thing, but it’s also rather long-winded and detailed. More later perhaps. Credit to those who have waded through the detail and taken it to the public inquiry stage.

Update – I’ve now added more information, see Railway Museum plans and Leeman Road.

Update: 23 Sept 2021

Local media reports today:

Great news – or a huge two-fingers to York? Leeman Road will close, rules Transport Secretary (York Mix)

Grant Shapps gives green light to close Leeman Road in York (York Press)

The post Public inquiry on closure of (part of) Leeman Road appeared first on York Stories.

Emerging from the tunnel

Previously, we headed through the Marble Arch tunnel to have a wander along Cinder Lane, behind the station. This time we’re emerging from the tunnel to have a quick walk along Leeman Road, with photos taken a few weeks back, on 19 April.

This led me to think more about the proposed closure of Leeman Road, and the railway museum expansion plans.

As pictured above, we emerge from the tunnel to a rather cluttered assemblage of signs and railings, and a metal footbridge over the road.

We pass the Railway Museum. Just past it, across the road, demolition is underway on one of the buildings being removed for the York Central redevelopment.

Demolition of concrete works, off Leeman Road

It was a concrete works, apparently.

Though I may have given the impression in the past of wanting to hang on to every old industrial building in this area, that isn’t the case. I wasn’t even aware of this one.

I walked a bit further along Leeman Road, having read references to York Central including tree clearance works close to Bishopfields Drive, a road I’ve never been down and thought I would.

Leeman Road

It’s not a handsome road, Leeman Road. Functional, industrial, commercial. It heads off away from the city centre round the edge of the railway lands, under a bridge under the railway line and towards a large area of mainly terraced housing. (We’re not going that far on this occasion, though I have previously, quite a few times.).

I’m not sure how much traffic it carries at busier times, but it seems generally quiet when I’m up here.

Just past the demolition site of the concrete works is quite a large development of interlinking streets, a fairly recent build. A couple of photos I have from back in 2004 suggest it was partly built by then.

Phoenix Boulevard and connecting streets, off Leeman Road

It’s interesting, as it seems to have taken quite a chunk out of what used to be called the ‘teardrop’ site. I’m not sure why this area of land was developed when others weren’t. It’s apparently called St Peter’s Quarter, though I hadn’t realised that until I was compiling this page.

The housing is in a style I don’t think I’ve seen elsewhere in York (though clearly I haven’t been to every part of town). I had a walk to the far edge of it, where there’s a green space, with part of the York Central site on the other side. I couldn’t see anything much from there as there was still a lot of tree and shrub coverage.

The community of houses here felt very ‘self-contained’, which I guess it would as it’s on the edge of a large brownfield site. The majority of the Leeman Road area housing is quite some way further down Leeman Road.

Next to St Peter’s Quarter are just two short terraced streets, apparently connected with the old foundry buildings I visited many years back. (See this very old page from summer 2004 and this equally old page on the nearby railway lands.)

There used to be a pub here too, the Junction. That was demolished and replaced with housing.

Time to head back towards town, past the Railway Museum. Which I used to call the National Railway Museum, or NRM, but it’s apparently had a rebranding.

Railway Museum, Leeman Road

A major part of the redevelopment of York Central is the ambitious plan for a radical overhaul of the Railway Museum. It would involve the closure of part of Leeman Road, as an official notice on a lamppost reminded me.

Notice on lamppost regarding public inquiry over road closure

In recent days the public inquiry on this road closure has been taking place, and I’ve got around to reading more about it, as I’ve been meaning to for some time. But as I’m trying to keep these pages to a reasonable and readable length, I’ll add something about that another time. Tomorrow perhaps, as my ‘May daily’ idea is going well so far.

Thanks for reading. As always, your virtual coffees are welcome in support of this long-running record of York and its changes.

The post Leeman Road and York Central appeared first on York Stories.

Entrance to Marble Arch tunnel

Let’s go for a little walk … not under the moon of love, but down the Marble Arch tunnel on Leeman Road.

You can always rely on these pages to take you to some glamorous and exotic places.

Though so much of York is prettified and gentrified, this place remains proper ‘gritty’ and grubby. Already unwelcoming, now with one of those bossy signs added for good measure. I’m wondering if this old pedestrian tunnel under the railway lines can ever be enhanced.

Once you’re in it, or rather when you’re nearly at the other end of it, it does have a certain photogenic quality, if the sun’s in the right place and shining off its white glazed bricks.

In the Marble Arch tunnel

I had a quick walk down this way one sunny evening a few weeks back, 19 April, to see what had been occurring in terms of the demolition work on the York Central site.

If you turn left after the tunnel there’s an alleyway, Cinder Lane, which cuts through round the edge of the York Central site. I’ve walked up here a few times before.

It still grows a good crop of wildflowers, in crevices in its old brickwork.

Wild things in the wall, Cinder Lane

It still has the Cinder Lane shed. Which I’ve admired many times, lovely wonky old thing.

Recently, in reports submitted as part the York Central redevelopment, I’ve seen it referred to as the Fire House.

Old shed – known as the Fire House, apparently

It’s considered interesting enough to keep, though it seems it’s going to be dismantled and moved elsewhere.

This small timber shed off Cinder Lane appears on maps of 1930s but may be older. Known to Network Rail as the Fire House it is currently assumed to have stored a fire engine.

It is recommended the shed should be carefully recorded and dismantled for re-erection elsewhere in York Central. Suggested locations might include the Foundry Yard or Central Park.

– York Central design guide

I wonder how this will work. It looks like it might collapse into itself as soon as one part is lifted from it, but then I’m no expert. I do recall though reading of other historic structures removed in the past that were supposed to be reused, and which weren’t, perhaps because they got stuck in a corner in storage somewhere and forgotten about.

Anyway, nice to know that I wasn’t alone in finding this wooden shed rather interesting.

If we continue along Cinder Lane, the footbridge over the railway gives a view I’m rather fond of. I’ve included a similar photo in the past, but went to have a look again, before it changes.

Former wagon repair works/Freightliner

Several disused buildings are to be demolished, and this is one of them.

I wonder if the structures built in its place will have the same kind of charm, in the evening sunlight. I wonder if they’ll block the view out from here towards Holgate and Poppleton Road school. Probably. And the view back this way, which I always appreciate, when cycling back from Acomb and turning into Water End, with railway buildings and railway lines and the Minster in the distance.

Anyway, time to head back to look at York Central from another angle. Appreciating, on the way, a wild plant that still hangs on in here, on the top of the wall, by the rusty old railings.

Herb Robert, Cinder Lane

Back in 2012 I included a photo of it, here in Cinder Lane, but back then I didn’t know what it was called. I now know that it’s Herb Robert, and that it likes growing in my back garden. In more favourable conditions, its leaves are green.

My walk continued along part of Leeman Road. More to follow. Possibly tomorrow even. Maybe a ‘May daily’ …

The post Cinder Lane, the Fire House, and York Central appeared first on York Stories.

As a place it has been covered on these pages many times over the years, under different names.

It might have been better, to avoid confusion, if this area of land had kept its old name of the York Teardrop (describing the shape of the piece of land) — but clearly a more dynamic-sounding and cheerful name was needed, and now we’re stuck with it.

It’s not really that central at all …  But anyway …

I wrote about the plans for York Central a while back. Hoped that whatever was made from this area would be a positive addition, to benefit residents, something we could feel connected to and proud of.

The signs weren’t looking good on that.

Recently, in November this year, York Central by Allies and Morrison was named ‘best masterplan’ at the 2019 Architects Journal awards:

According to the judges, this 46ha scheme has the bone structure to become better than King’s Cross – the multi-award-winning placemaking poster boy also masterplanned by Allies and Morrison and with which it has numerous parallels.

The plan covers a large brownfield site next to the city’s historic core which radiates from York’s railway station and railyards and incorporates the National Railway Museum, which is the scheme’s main cultural anchor. The project aims to deliver a new park, central gallery, up to 2,500 homes and 100,000m2 of offices, shops and hotels.

Us and our brownfield bone structure, we might be better than that London …

Most interesting, perhaps, is this part of the text:

It will provide a framework for sustainable urban and economic development and create a compact urban extension that is imbued with ‘Yorkness’.

I’m not sure I could refer to ‘Yorkness’ so confidently, even after half a century of living here and experiencing it.

Never mind me and my minor Yorkie gripes, they’ve won an award, and many people seemed very happy about it. (Though other responses on Twitter made it clear that many local residents are far from happy about the award.)

… but, locally, doesn’t look like it’s connecting to many of the people who live here, to Yorkness, Yorkites, Yorkies, still.

. . . . .

Thanks for your virtual coffees in support of the above, and all the rest of yorkstories.co.uk.

The post York Central … appeared first on York Stories.

Previously, some weeks back, I left us standing by the riverside admiring Scarborough Bridge. I had intended to stay by the riverside, and focus on proposed flood defence works, but the flow of planned pages was interrupted, and the writing dried up for a bit as I had to attend to other commitments. But let’s take up near to where we left off. As Scarborough Bridge is so close to the railway station, and there are significant developments in plans for the land around it, let’s hang around the station area for a while.

From Scarborough Bridge we can head off up the path by the sorting office, and up the cycle/pedestrian path to access the station from one end. Across the platforms at this end, as pictured above, we can see through to part of the National Railway Museum and one edge of the piece of land known as York Central. I’ve written about it many times in the past, but not recently.

As was widely reported in the media last month, the outline planning application for this huge and complex site was approved by the planning committee on 25 March. That’s obviously a major milestone in what has been a long-running project. Reaction has been rather mixed, and interesting, and I wanted to write something about that, and some coverage of it in the Yorkshire Post this week.

A year ago today, 27 April 2018, I paid a visit to the My York Central exhibition/consultation event at the NRM on the York Central plans. The display boards were covered by an impressive number of post-it notes, with many ideas and responses.

Post-it notes on exhibition boards at the NRM, 27 April 2018

Clearly many people put a lot of time and effort into engaging with the plans, wanting to help shape them.

It’s important to acknowledge the huge amount of work that has gone in to this project to develop the large area of land behind the station. It’s important to acknowledge how long it has taken, in terms of years, and in terms of the many hours of work by many individuals, organisations, companies over that time, and particularly in the last year or so.

Many of the people who worked on putting the outline planning application together have been handsomely rewarded financially. It’s also important to recognise that many people, whether as part of a group or as individuals, put in a commitment, many hours, and didn’t get paid for that, but did the work because they care about the future of the city.

I wasn’t one of them, I’ve had to focus my energies elsewhere, but have done my best to keep up with happenings, including watching parts of the webcast of the planning meeting to decide whether to approve the outline plans.

The meeting included excellent and passionate speakers, and many strong objections.

But of course, by that stage, it would be approved. This long-running saga of the old ‘teardrop’ site has been going on for years, and so much work and time has gone into getting it to the stage of an actual outline application.

I’m not on Twitter much these days, but did check it for comment and reaction during the planning meeting and in the day or two afterwards, as the news of the application approval was reported. Anger and dismay was expressed in many tweets from local residents who had campaigned against various aspects of the plans, with things getting a bit heated and personal at one stage, on Twitter (as things so often do on Twitter).

Alongside the anger, and forming a striking contrast, were many celebratory and triumphant comments from organisations and companies who had been involved in developing the plans to this stage, pleased that the plans had been approved. It looked like a complete divide, opposing views.

I looked for something that might balance it out, from someone who knows the city well and has been observing the city and its goings-on for longer than I have. In such situations I often look to see what Steve Galloway thinks. His view is that ‘the progress made in bringing forward the site will probably be recorded by history as the major achievement of the current Council coalition administration.’

Still another stage to go through yet, however, as a call-in request means Communities Secretary James Brokenshire is considering the plans, and could order a public inquiry to scrutinise the project, as reported in the Yorkshire Post earlier this week.

York Civic Trust and the city’s MP Rachael Maskell are opposed to the plans, and support a call-in and further scrutiny. As would many of the people who spoke at the meeting on 25 March, I would assume.

On the other hand, the Yorkshire Post reports that

‘two Yorkshire council leaders, Wakefield’s Peter Box and Bradford’s Susan Hinchcliffe, have now written to the Minister along with Ben Still, the director of the Leeds City Region Local Enterprise Partnership, to reassure him about the level of support for York Central.’

I’ll just leave that there, and you, dear readers, can decide who might know best about the level of support, whose support is being referred to, etc. Otherwise I might start going on about ownership and cultural significance, etc, again.

The Yorkshire Post too has a view, presumably in response to the above, published a couple of days ago (25 April). Headed ‘The Yorkshire Post says: Landmark York Central development offers county-wide benefits’, it refers to the ‘political, business and civic leaders from across Yorkshire who want to maximise the benefits that can be accrued’.

The development opportunities of York Central seem to have been enthusiastically embraced by many, but it does rather look like this huge development is something on its own, a kind of separate thing to the city, and that it has failed to connect to the energies around it, those demonstrated by the passionate people who had high hopes for the site.

I’d prefer to think that this important place, once a thriving industrial area, a heart of York, still felt like ‘ours’, something the people of York will feel connected to, proud of, fond of, part of. It’s not looking that way at present. I hope that in time that will change.

– – – – –

Footnote

York Stories is my personal perspective on York and its changes. It has been online for 15 years in various forms, updated frequently sometimes, at other times with quite long gaps between its observations/musings. I’ve been online browsing, connected to this thing called the internet, for 20 years. Among the increasing amount of content and all the sound and fury of social media I find I appreciate more the more thoughtful things I find,  a considered view, a long view. As a York born-and-bred person who has memories of this city going back to the 1970s I do my best to add my bit to the online world in a thoughtful kind of fashion, and keep the angry/opinionated stuff to offline discussions at the kitchen table. If you’d like to support this online thing, with its monthly hosting bills and its generally tranquil and advert-free environment, your virtual coffees are always appreciated – essential actually – in keeping it online.

The post York Central update: reaction to outline planning approval, from York and beyond appeared first on York Stories.