INTERESTING that the local authorities may find £300,000 for required consultancy work to assess the viability of dualling the York outer ring road.

Perhaps it should compare this chestnut with costing a new dual carriageway, creating a true ring-road: necessarily incorporating a new river crossing, also crossing the East Coast Mainline.

Take traffic from the A64 south of York, outside Poppleton, to the Thirsk side of Shipton, crossing the Scarborough line between Strensall and Haxby and following the existing alongside QE2/Strensall camp and gunnery ranges, heading east to a new interchange linking to a dualled A64, north-east of York.

It could:

1. Save the frustration and dislocation of dualling the A1237

2. Ultimately create a significantly improved A1M connexion via an upgraded A59 link

3. Reduce A19 traffic around Shipton-by-Beningbrough, creating a Shipton bypass

4. Supersede the existing Corbyn Lane rat-run at Wigginton

5. Incorporate a parkway station between Strensall and Haxby (including a park and train facility) benefiting not merely those two centres, but existing traffic from Easingwold, Thirsk and Malton

6. Consider the often-discussed ‘halt’ station at York Hospital, thereby removing a significant amount of York Hospital traffic, staff and outpatients, also from Malton

7. Remove significant existing road pressure across north York.

Nick Blitz, Wilkinsons Court, Easingwold