CLIMATE activists in York are hoping to build a coalition of opposition to £65 million plans to dual part of York’s outer ring road – and are considering mounting a legal challenge.
Extinction Rebellion York say about 50 representatives from different local community groups and organisations took part in a public meeting at Spark:York on Sunday evening.
They included the York Cycle Campaign and the York Environment Forum.
Laura Autumn Cox of Extinction Rebellion York said there would be further meetings to decide how best to muster opposition to dualling of the ring road.
“We have identified some key strategies – including a potential legal challenge based on the misleading information that has been used to build the proposal,” she said.
“Our task now is to keep engaging with and placing pressure on local councillors to reject the proposal and the government money that comes with it.
“We’re confident we can stop the project from going ahead, and we’ll fight it on all fronts.”
But she added that, if the worst came to the worst, Extinction Rebellion members WOULD ultimately be prepared to consider going it alone with direct action ‘if we feel this is necessary to raise awareness and, in the worst case scenario, delay the construction project’.
She would not be drawn on what form of direct action might be considered.
Sunday night’s public meeting came after City of York council last year submitted a planning application for dualling of part of the A1237 York Outer Ring Road.
The authority says the £65 million upgrade, which includes improvements to five roundabouts, is aimed at reducing congestion, moving car journeys out of the city centre and improving active travel facilities for pedestrians and cyclists.
But Ms Cox said it had been known for decades that trying to tackle congestion by building more roads simply increased both congestion and emissions.
Speaking before Sunday night’s meeting, she said dualling the outer ring road would create not just one but two huge new roads, one travelling in each direction.
“York has just adopted its climate change strategy, calling for a 71 per cent reduction in emissions from transport in York,” she said. “And as their first major act, they plan a significant expansion in road capacity, which will take us in the opposite direction."
The ring road scheme is expected to be approved by a council planning committee on February 2. That would be exactly seven weeks since the council adopted its climate change strategy.
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