STANG Road campaigners are celebrating after County Durham officers made a dramatic u-turn on how often they grit the treacherous route.
Officers met campaigners on Friday, January 31, where they agreed to co-ordinate with North Yorkshire highways department about gritting when wintry weather is expected.
However, they came short of upgrading the road to priority one status.
Campaigner and clerk to Hope and Scargill Parish Meeting Jed Collins said: “We believe it will effectively be the same [as priority one status] because they will be gritting it when Richmond does. It is not quite what we asked for, but we expect it is the same thing effectively.”
Mr Collins and his group applied for a judicial review into a decision made by County Durham bosses not to upgrade the road’s gritting status but this was rejected.
However, an appeal against the court’s decision not to grant the review found that it was questionable whether officers had actually made a decision as there were no minutes of meetings or what rationale was used to make any decision.
In that judgement, Judge Penelope Belcher said: “This is a renewed application for permission to bring proceedings for judicial review of a decision – or alleged decision – the local highways authority made, apparently, in August 2018, but maybe in January 2019, or maybe not at all. I say this because, at best, we have documents showing recommendations but no documents recording any decisions. It seems to me there are strong grounds for challenging this decision on the grounds of irrationality. Therefore, I give permission to proceed.”
A meeting of the judicial review then took place on January 16. Mr Collins said: “At the last judicial review in Leeds the judge said for both sides to come together and find some common ground.”
He added that highways officers had visited him at his business on Friday, January 31, where the proposal to coordinate gritting with North Yorkshire was agreed.
Mr Collins said: “This is what we asked for as long ago as 2004. We got together at the CB Inn and it was all enthusiastic. But we went away and Durham County Council refused to upgrade the treatment of the road. The only way to get treatment equal along the entire stretch of the road was for North Yorkshire to downgrade theirs. We didn’t want that.
“Most of the effort started in 2017 when we began to use social media. It has borne weight. The outcome was that they are now going to treat The Stang on the Durham side at the same time as Yorkshire treat their side. This will make your Stang travelling a lot safer. I am relieved – it has been a long time.”
Mr Collins paid tribute his neighbours Ruth Surendran and Nick Turner who had offered legal advice which had helped secure the judicial review. It is expected the review will now be cancelled.
Helen Lynch, Durham County Council’s head of legal and democratic services, said: “We have had a positive meeting with Mr Collins but as the judicial review proceedings are ongoing, it would not be appropriate for us to comment further.”
