From Kez Armitage

Tuesday, 23 December 2014

Well the New Year's not far away, and it started me thinking about my own 'wish list' for Hebden Bridge in the forthcoming year. And here it is:

1. I hope that, finally, work begins on installing a lift at Hebden Bridge railway station. It's been promised, and we've seen lifts installed in so many other stations, so let's have some action in our town.

2. The waste land at Mytholm works has planning permission for a supermarket and hotel, but as yet, nothing has been done. I'd like to see an Aldi, or other low cost supermarket on the site, but if nobody is prepared to develop it, I'd like it to be landscaped and turned into a park and ride for town and/or an ecological park, open to everyone.

3. I'd like to see better promotion of our town's greatest selling point, which is its spectacular setting. Great advances have been made in the promotion of walking and other outdoor activities, but this needs to be taken further. For example the 'walkers' bus', ie the 906 service from Widdop to Hardcastle Crags, should run all year round. It is a nonsense that it finishes in October each year. There's no evidence that walkers stop walking then, in fact on the contrary.

4. Car ownership isn't going to go away in the foreseeable future, and so I hope that a real effort is made to deal with our parking problem. I watched a car the other day circling round Crown Street, Cheetham Street and Hope Street fifteen times, presumably hoping that a free space would become available.

5. Still on traffic, I'd like 'no parking' refuges to be put in place on Keighley Road, especially at the blind corners, and I'd like measures taken to prevent people doing u-turns at the bottom of Church Lane (rather than use the turning circle). And as the Fox and Goose pub becomes more popular, something needs to be done to prevent Heptonstall-bound traffic from speeding up, gathering momentum to take them up the hill. Do we really need to wait for a fatality for something to be done?

6. I sincerely hope that Bede Mullen can resolve the problem of his hydro-electric scheme in the Colden Valley. This is a flagship scheme, which could pave the way for so many more. That it should fail over a dispute about a few feet of land under a bridge is a sad reflection of our today's society.

Have I forgotten anything?