The Department of Transport was accused of "madness on a sacrificial human scale" after it rejected calls to close a gap on the A64 ...almost eight years ago.

Consulting engineer James Taylor has revealed how the Government was dragging its heels over closure of the gap in the central reservation at Bilbrough Top, between York and Tadcaster, as long ago as early 1992.

Speaking as the Evening Press campaign to Close the Gap was coming to a climax this afternoon with the planned handover of our 800-signature petition to Roads Minister Lord Whitty, Mr Taylor said he proposed the gap's closure in 1991 but the proposal was rejected by the Government. He said a Department of Transport official wrote in March, 1992, that closure of the gap would "require statutory orders to be published in draft and possibly be the subject of public inquiries."

The official said the procedures would need to take account of the effect on local traffic and the department could not give any undertaking that the closure could be achieved.

Mr Taylor says he warned then that the "totally intransigent" department was waiting "until significant numbers of deaths or serious accidents occur before they will consider prevention measures. This is madness on a sacrificial human scale."

In late 1999, the gap remains open, having caused a series of accidents over the years, and the department remains adamant that it cannot be shut until a flyover is built in several years' time.

Mr Taylor, of Dossor Taylor, the consulting civil and structural engineers of Huntington, asked: "Is there a will to close this gap and reduce the inevitable and continuing carnage and suffering?

"If it is only statutory orders, procedures and a public inquiry, then get on with it. Which is more important, public safety or bureaucracy?"

Mr Taylor, a former President of the York Society of Engineers, revealed that a study in 1993 predicted peak traffic flows on the A64 would grow so much over the following 15 years that no vehicles would be able to cross or merge with the flows.

"This is an extremely busy junction on a fast trunk road with good horizontal alignment, and right-turning and crossing traffic movements are totally inconsistent with safety."

A Highways Agency spokesman said today its position remained the same. "We want to see the closure of all the central reserve gaps, but not until safe and adequate alternative arrangements such as new junctions are in place." He added that plans for a new junction with flyovers at Bilbrough Top were currently being progressed.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.