We have to give the City of York Council the benefit of the doubt, but those of us living outside the boundary of the old York City Council have reason to query its understanding of our concerns and the weight it gives to our needs.

Take the Green Belt for example. It has a purpose clearly explained by its name. At the second stage of the York Plan, however, the North Selby Mine Surface is still shown as a designated industrial site. This despite the unequivocal undertaking made by the then government after the public inquiry that the site would be returned to agricultural use.

Why disregard that undertaking?

It is difficult to see the benefit to York of an isolated industrial site on its very boundary, in a wholly agricultural environment. The site feeds onto the A19 which, as everyone who has to use it will confirm, is already at or over saturation at rush hours. Traffic on the A19 flows more easily to the south of the site, indicating that it is more likely to attract a workforce from Selby than from York. The industrial rates it would generate would not come to York. As with many of the decisions affecting the rural areas of York this one seems to be founded on a sense of resentment rather than on objective good sense.

Maurice Vassie,

Cartmans Cottage,

Deighton,

York.

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