A campaign group opposed to the £14.3m Harrogate Station Gateway scheme is seeking fresh legal advice after council chiefs gave the go-ahead for work to start.
Senior councillors at North Yorkshire Council this week gave officers the authority to sign contracts for the work and agree funding with West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA) and the York & North Yorkshire Combined Authority.
But the Get Away group, which was launched by several Harrogate businesses, said it was “outraged” by the decision and said it would seek legal advice on whether it was lawful.
The group is already preparing for a Court of Appeal review of a judge’s earlier decision to dismiss its challenge of several traffic regulation orders issued by the council to implement the scheme.
Steven Baines, spokesperson for Get Away, said:
“The council want to take a hard, long look at themselves. They need to ask themselves whether this is morally right.
“If there was a review relating to any other development in the town, would they let it go ahead? There seems to be one rule for them and another rule for the rest of us.”
David Waddington, a consultant for Hornbeam Park Developments, added:
“It seems incredulous that a scheme that a freedom of information request has identified as poor value for money based on a benefit-to-cost ratio; and has been classified as high risk by the council due likely to the uncertainty caused by the opposition against it, has now decided to play a high stakes game by going ahead when an appeal is pending.”
Senior councillors this week expressed frustration that the project had been delayed by “a few people who don’t like something”.
In response, Mr Baines said:
“It’s laughable that the council has accused a small group of campaigners for disrupting this scheme.
“The message is clearly not getting through that the vast majority of traders in the town centre have grave concerns about the scheme on business and safety grounds and do not want it to go ahead.”
Get Away said it would be writing to West Yorkshire Combined Authority and the Department for Transport to challenge the lawfulness of any decision to release funding for the project.
North Yorkshire Council declined to comment.
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