PLANS to bring car-free flats to York are under discussion as part of radical solutions to combat the city's growing congestion woes.

The idea was discussed in a meeting of Hungate Community Trust, the independent group formed to oversee development of a massive 720-flat development in Hungate.

City planners admit legally they are unable to tie car-free restrictions to new properties and currently rely on developers voluntarily incorporating such an innovative idea.

Derek Gould, of City of York Council's Hungate team, said the authority was now actively encouraging all new city centre developments down this environmentally-friendly path, already popular in northern Europe and Scandinavia.

Car park spaces in new flat developments in York are generally limited to one per apartment in York.

However, one-third of the 720 planned flats at the long-delayed Hungate site will not have parking spaces.

Hundreds of secure cycle spaces have been set aside. Vehicles that do park will be underground, in a project which developers say is a pedestrian-friendly benchmark. After the meeting, Mr Gould said: "Car-free housing is something that we are looking at with all developers.

"Traffic is not going away in York and we are looking at car clubs, car sharing and car-free homes."

He added: "We tell developers it won't damage sales and it may actually make such properties safer and more attractive.

"If they came up with such a scheme we would definitely back it. Hopefully one day it will become national policy."

Mr Gould said other ideas included handing residents bus passes or bikes as part of the property purchase.

News of the car-free talks came as the Hungate Trust unveiled ideas to make the development even more environmentally-friendly.

Chairman Gordon Campbell-Thomas said plans for an on-site recycling centre, supermarket deliveries by cycle and special car rental deals for residents would be taken to developers.

Hungate developers today stressed the environmentally-friendly nature of their plans.

Crosby Homes (Yorkshire) director Rick Deakin said: "Mindful of the council's policy of reducing the number of journeys made by car, the urban neighbourhood we are proposing for Hungate has been carefully designed to encourage people living there or passing through it to walk or cycle."

Updated: 08:19 Friday, March 19, 2004