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Harrogate and Knaresborough MP Andrew Jones has turned down an invitation to meet the company behind plans to build an asphalt plant near Knaresborough and discuss his concerns about the proposals. 

Tynedale Roadstone wants to create the facility next door to the controversial incinerator at Allerton Waste Recovery Park (AWRP), but Mr Jones recently said the company had not done enough to allay worries about pollution, traffic movements, and the potential for ground water contamination. 

He also flagged concerns regarding the plant’s long operating hours and said that it would represent “industrial creep” – the gradual expansion of industry at a formerly rural site. 

Extending the invitation to Mr Jones, Lichfields, which is acting as planning consultant to Tynedale Roadstone, said the site was an appropriate location for the plant in part due to its proximity to the A1(M) and because it would deliver “sustainability advantages” by reusing one of the AWRP’s by-products.

In a statement, a spokesperson from parent company MGL Group said: 

“We are aware of some concerns regarding pollution, traffic movements, operational hours, dust, odour and noise.” 

They added: 

“The installation of the proposed asphalt plant at Allerton Park will be a brand-new, state-of-the-art facility that will meet stringent environmental, noise and emission criteria in the asphalt production process.

“Modern asphalt plants have extensive process filtration systems used with clean fuels to constantly maintain and monitor all the emissions from the production processes and ensure that they are kept within the correct protocol.” 

But Mr Jones replied to MGL, saying he was “not sure a meeting is necessary”. He told the Stray Ferret: 

“I share residents’ concerns about this proposal. Legally, councillors and planning officers have to consider the planning application that has been submitted. So, a private meeting between the applicants and me when a planning application is already live cannot change what is before us. And I believe what is before us is wrong.   

“The time to meet with me and local residents asking for our advice and views was before the application was submitted. That would have demonstrated a genuine interest in what we had to say. 

“So my preference would be for the application to be withdrawn and the applicant to hold face-to-face meetings with residents about their plans. My team and I will be happy to join those meetings. This would allow residents to have real input in a genuine consultation rather than the ‘take-it-or-leave-it’ approach which is where we seem to be now.”

The MGL spokesperson said the technical material supporting the planning application concluded there would be no significant environmental effects as a result of traffic movements, dust, odour, and noise, “subject to best practice measures being employed at the site”.

They added:

“Both we and Lichfields continue to work with North Yorkshire Council and are committed to alleviating concerns and addressing any comments made on the application.”

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Allerton Park incinerator near Knaresborough hailed a success at scrutiny meeting

Five years after its launch, the controversial £1.4 billion energy-from-waste incinerator near Knaresborough has been declared a success, even by some of the community leaders who voted against it.

The landmark Allerton Park plant, near the junction of the A1(M) and the A59 east of Knaresborough, drew fierce opposition and High Court legal challenges after being declared the best solution to managing 320,000 tonnes of waste a year to improve green disposal methods and avoid landfill costs.

Since the facility opened in 2018, Allerton Waste Recovery Park has continuously exceeded its 70 per cent target for diverting residents’ waste from landfill, achieving nearly 93 per cent last year.

However, the facility has never met the City of York and North Yorkshire Council’s target of recycling five per cent of items in the general waste, only managing just over two per cent for the first time last year.

But Councillor Greg White, North Yorkshire Council’s executive member for waste management, said the continued failure to hit the recycling target was partly caused by a positive reason.

Speaking ahead of a meeting of the council’s transport, environment and economy scrutiny committee examining the plant’s performance, he said that since residents separated high amounts of recyclable materials from their general waste, relatively little material of sufficient quality to recycle was being left to mechanically separate at the plant.

He said overall the facility had proved a success, but needed to increase the amount of energy which could be extracted from general waste at the same time as pressure was mounting from the government to have separate food waste collections.

The meeting heard Robert Windass, the Conservative councillor for Boroughbridge, claim that missing the waste recycling target was due to “the idleness of people who live in the houses who cannot be bothered to put it in their recycling bins”.

Cllr Windass, who went against his Conservative colleagues by voting against the facility as he did not believe the facility would be the best deal for taxpayers, said:

There were a lot of people in the community worried about pollution coming out of the chimneys, but there hasn’t been.”

Cllr Windass said chairing a residents’ liaison committee with the site had been “a hell of a job to start with”, with people fearing the plant would impact on their quality of life and house prices. He said:

“It does work very well. Residents are much more relaxed about it now. The only complaint which we get is HGVs queuing on the road if they can’t get into the site.”

The scrutiny committee heard that since the facility was launched it had dealt with more than 1.5 million tonnes of waste and saved 330,000 tonnes of carbon emissions.

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But the meeting also heard that councils were effectively incentivised to provide as much waste as possible as they are paid for it by the site’s operator, which in turn acted as a disincentive to educate residents more about what to recycle.

Councillors were told while processing waste from Derbyshire increased North Yorkshire’s carbon emissions at the site, efforts were underway to cut overall emissions from the site.

After the meeting, the authority’s leader, Conservative Councillor Carl Les, said:

“I thought it was the right thing to do at the time and I still think it’s the right thing to do.

“People call it an incinerator, but it’s producing energy from waste. We should all adopt that hierarchy reduce, recycle, re-use, but there comes a point where you can’t any further, so to get rid of the residual waste and generating energy I think is the right thing.

“I would now like to see some way of capturing the waste heat that is generated and capturing that and we are looking at partners to come next to the site and use that heat.”

His comment is likely to draw criticism from Harrogate and Knaresborough MP Andrew Jones, who this week raised concerns about further development – or “industrial creep” – at the site.

MP raises concerns over Knaresborough asphalt plant ‘industrial creep’

Harrogate and Knaresborough MP Andrew Jones has expressed concern at a proposal to build an asphalt factory next to the Allerton Waste Recovery Park six miles east of Knaresborough.

The proposal has been re-advertised after the company making the application, Tynedale Roadstone Ltd, submitted an updated environmental statement to accompany the plans.

As well as the asphalt plant, the application includes plans for a site office, car parking, material storage bays, lighting, hard standing and the removal of trees.

Mr Jones said:

“I worked with residents’ groups and parish councils campaigning against the incinerator being built. Part of our objections were the potential for ‘industrial creep’ in the area. This application is precisely that.

“I have already registered my objection when the application was at an earlier stage of the planning process. I have read the new documents the applicants have submitted and I do not believe the concerns I raised have been adequately addressed.

“Those concerns include the potential for further industrial creep, the pollution caused by the production process, the traffic movements during the working day which ends, according to the planning statement, at 11pm and the potential for ground water contamination. I am concerned too that the plant will, in due course, become a 24/7 operation.

“Because this is an update to the planning application I have submitted a further objection and I encourage those in the neighbourhood who want to make their own representation to do so urgently. The deadline is 25 October.”

Mr Jones is not alone in his concern over the proposals – during the consultation process, two local parish councils also registered objections, citing dust, odours, noise and increased traffic among their reasons.

In its official response, Arkendale, Coneythorpe & Clareton Parish Council pointed out that when the Allerton Waste Recovery Park was approved in 2014, North Yorkshire County Council (NYCC) – which has since been superseded by North Yorkshire Council – had assured residents that it would be a one-off installation and would not lead to further industrial ribbon development along the A1(M) corridor.

It added:

“If this development is allowed to proceed, what NYCC promised these local communities will have been proven to be false and we would be right to feel let down by the democratic process.”

The response from Goldsborough & Flaxby Parish Council was more blunt, asking:

“Why is a ‘dirty’ process such as this be even considered at Allerton? Why is it even needed at all? It should not be in a rural location and should not be allowed to be erected next to an incinerator that is already spoiling a rural location.”

Tynedale Roadstone is part of Durham-based MGL Group and currently operates two asphalt production plants, one in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and another at Barton, north of Catterick in North Yorkshire.

Asphalt is a mix of aggregates and bitumen – which is distilled from crude oil – and is commonly used in roadbuilding.

The Stray Ferret has contacted MGL Group for comment.

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Victorian church clock restored in Harrogate district

Villagers are celebrating the restoration of their Victorian church clock following a £7,000 restoration project.

Residents came together last year to launch the platinum jubilee clock restoration project for St Bartholomew’s Church in Arkendale, which is between Knaresborough and Boroughbridge.

A community event has been held to unveil the clock, which features gold leaf gilded dials that match the original, and the clock mechanism has been deep-cleaned.

Cllr Robert Windass, a Conservative who represents Boroughbridge and Claro on North Yorkshire Council, was the largest funder with £2,500 from his locality budget.

The locality budget provides £10,000 for each councillor to spend on specific local activities each year.

Cllr Windass said:

“I’m delighted to join the community in celebrating the long-awaited unveiling of the church clock. The large-scale project involved making new clock faces to match the original, and the mechanism was overhauled to make sure it will run for many years to come.

“It has been a joint effort to pull this off and I’m proud to have contributed some of my locality budget to such a worthwhile cause.”

(from left), Colin Fletcher, account director at Allerton Waste Recovery Park, Cllr Robert Windass and church warden Robyn Cox

Funding also came from local sponsors and donations through a Sponsor a Numeral Campaign, as well as Thalia Waste Management at Allerton Waste Recovery Park, the Church of England’s ChurchCare scheme, the Moto Foundation and Hanson Cement at Allerton Park.

Harrogate adult mental health charity Claro Enterprises carved the plaque.

It was made using offcuts donated by furniture makers Robert Thompson’s Craftsmen, which is responsible for creating famous Mouseman furniture in Kilburn.

Robyn Cox, the warden of St Bartholomew’s Church, added:

“It’s a new moment in time at St Bartholomew’s where the community came together with support from grant-funding bodies and local businesses to restore the clock dials and mechanism. It was a project we started to celebrate the platinum jubilee of our beloved late Queen Elizabeth II.”

A place of worship has stood in the village since the 14th century, although the present building dates from 1836. It was the first church to be consecrated in the then new Diocese of Ripon in January 1837.

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