What sort of city do we want York to be?

WHAT sort of city do we want to pass on to our children? A green and pleasant York that is little more than a dormitory community for the larger economies of Leeds, Sheffield and Hull?

A hi-tech city, that has ridden the wave of the electronics revolution the way the York of George Hudson's time seized on the railway revolution?

A modern, cosmopolitan, Yuppie city, driven by the financial and legal sectors, one crammed with gleaming executive flats but where there is little room for the ordinary working man?

Or a sleepy, old-fashioned, beautiful city that rests on its laurels and gets by on the income generated by tourists?

Perhaps none of these, perhaps a mixture of them all. What's important is that, at long last, we are finally being asked to think about these things.

The men - and it has to be said they are mainly men, middle-aged and white - who run York have a vision. They want to look to the future, to define the kind of city that York is going to become. And they want us to help.

It is not before time. It is easy, as we go about our busy lives, to forget about the bigger picture. There are the children to feed; the deadlines to meet; the promotion to chase; the next house on the property ladder to find.

Out of the corner of our eyes, we may notice another slice of precious green land in the centre of York being swallowed up by executive flats, or grumble about why the city centre seems dead after 5.30pm. We might wish that room could be found for, say, a planetarium or a decent concert venue, that something could be provided for bored teenagers, or that there could be a few more street cafs where we could go to wile away the pleasant summer evenings.

But we haven't got time to worry about those things too much - and anyway, York's a nicer place to live than most. And so, gradually, the city around us changes, evolves in ways that are unplanned and possibly undesirable.

The planning system is there, to put a check on uncontrolled development. But without a clear-cut, overarching vision of what kind of city we want York to be in the future, those who sit on planning committees and draw up planning guidelines are left fumbling in the dark, deciding individual applications on their own merits without much thought to how they fit into the larger scheme.

This approach has led to eyesores in the past - the Ryedale building and Stonebow House, to name two - and seems today to be leaving the city at the mercy of developers keen to turn every inch of green or brown land into more plush homes.

It has also seen even big developments, such as Coppergate II and New Osbaldwick, ruled on in a 'piecemeal' fashion that makes it hard to take into account how they will fit in to York as a whole.

It is a problem of which York Civic Trust is well aware.

"We have been concerned for some time that no one is looking to the horizon," says chairman Darrell Buttery. "We're using a microscope when we should be using a telescope. We look in detail at planning applications, which is right and proper, but we're not getting the bigger picture. We're worrying about tiny parcels of land no bigger than a back yard, about whether the window detail on flats is right, but not looking into the long term.

"It is quite essential that we should start to do this now."

Now the city council is acting, prompted, like other authorities, by the Government. It is taking the lead in setting up a Local Strategy Partnership board for York, a panel of people who will be charged with defining a clear vision for where the city is going, and then producing a strategy for achieving it.

"Somebody once had the vision to bring the railways to York," says David Atkinson, the city council's chief executive. "Presumably somebody once had a vision to build the Minster.

"Just because a vision is difficult to describe doesn't mean you don't have one. This city has got to decide where it is going. Does the city want to be a dormitory town for Leeds; a nice, conservative, sleepy city where everything is quaint and traditional; or a Cambridge of the North? We have to decide. What we can't do is not have a view."

Questions such as these are particularly important now, when planners are about to begin considering the future of the 'teardrop' - the 60 hectare (148 acre) site to the north and west of the railway station in York that is known by some as 'York Central' and is one of the largest brownfield sites available for development anywhere in the country.

What happens there could be pivotal to the way York develops in the future. And while an overall vision for the city probably won't determine in detail precisely what happens to the site, Mr Atkinson concedes, it will set a framework and a context within which development of the site can be considered. It's a larger context that, up until now, has been lacking.

The fact that the city council is at long last taking the lead in attempting to define a way forward for York is being welcomed by pressure groups with an interest in the city's architecture, heritage and environment.

But, as ever with such an ambitious undertaking, important questions remain about how it is to be achieved.

The panel charged with delivering on a vision for York, which was meeting officially for the first time today, is made up of the 'great and the good' - just the kind of people who have been pulling the strings in the city for years.

There is Mr Atkinson himself; the leaders of the three main political parties on the city council; Sir Ron Cooke, the about-to-retire vice-chancellor of York University; the Dean of York; Sue Ross, the chief executive of the city's Primary Health Care Trust; leading York policeman Supt John Lacy; Jenny Brierley, director of the York Housing Association, and Roland Harris, retiring chief executive of the York and North Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce.

All experienced, influential members of the community, certainly: but not exactly drawn from the people at large.

There are no representatives from the environmental lobby on the panel; nobody from the arts or sports worlds; no young people; precious few women. Worse, the panel was apparently chosen by Mr Atkinson himself and other, senior, unelected officials at the council.

It hardly engenders faith that the process of arriving at a vision for the future of York will be one in which all the people of the city can share.

Mr Atkinson himself is keenly aware that the panel is not fully representative. He says it was felt better to go for a small panel of people with a proven record of achievement, than to have a larger and more representative panel.

"These are people who can make things happen," he says. "There is not one of these people who is not either in a powerful position or does not have a powerful influence in the city.

"There was a stark choice: do we go for a small group of establishment people, who all know each other and can work together, or go for something more fully rounded, more inclusive, where you can end up arguing for ever without achieving anything.

"We're starting small, with a core of people that, whatever kind of local strategy partnership you have, are always going to be part of it. If we went for inclusive straight off, it may be inclusive, but nothing would happen."

It's an old dilemma, which on the face of it seems to have been resolved pretty much in the way it usually is: with a ruling elite calling the shots.

But just because the panel is exclusive, it doesn't follow that the process of arriving at a vision for the future of the city will be, Mr Atkinson insists. The panel is just the starting point.

What panel members will be discussing today, Mr Atkinson says, is how best to open up the discussion to embrace as many people and viewpoints in the city as possible.

"It would be a tragedy if this became just some sort of self-seeking little group of establishment people who just wanted more of the same, 'better sameness'," he says.

"We will be looking at how to develop a wider engagement, wider inclusiveness, wider consultation with the whole of the York community. We are very concerned that the vision should be inclusive and rounded. We cannot impose it."

Absolutely right. The people of York must make sure they don't get the chance.

Updated: 11:00 Wednesday, March 27, 2002