Free Online at www.coastalviewandmoornews.co.uk The Community Newspaper for the Towns and Villages of East Cleveland, Redcar & North York Moors, telling the real news and views of the people of our region Issue 72 August - September 2016
•• Now 26,000 copies monthly ••
Let’s see some goodwill for Longbeck!
● Skelton Industrial Estate’s potholes repaired
● Longbeck Industrial Estate and the roads to hell
R
emember the stories we have published in the past about the state of the roads on Longbeck Industrial estate in Marske? A local campaign of business owners, lead by Dave and Maureen Harland, then of Falklands Pine resulted in several articles, letters to the local MPs, meetings on site with business owners, local councillors and council officers, yet four years on, the problem has neither gone away nor been resolved and no-one seems to want to, or be able to do anything about it. In 1997 the Estate was purchased by J. Forman Ltd of London, from Redcar and Cleveland Council for the sum of £901,500. Since that date, the confusion has arisen over the ownership and responsibility for the roads as some of the units were then sold on to others. So can you imagine the surprise when we discover that the privately owned Skelton Industrial Estate which also had a problem with potholes, managed to persuade Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council to repair them! Let’s not take anything away from Skelton resident, Malcolm Crow who has campaigned for the work to be done in Skelton. Malcolm told Coastal View: “About three years ago I wrote to Tom Blenkinsop pointing out the dangerous roads. Along with Skelton councillor David Walsh all they could say was
that it was private land and had nothing to do with the council. “I persevered with e mails to Cllr Walsh and recently explained to him that the roads were getting worse by the day. What with Asda and the promise of Aldi / Marstons pub and other business arriving next year, there was a danger that there would be an accident. “He passed my e mails onto the council and they explained that the company had gone bust who owns the land. I then found out that Cllr Cliff Foggo was also involved, so I wrote to him and he told me that he had a meeting with the engineers and that they would repair as a goodwill gesture.” This work has now been done! Skelton Ward Councillor, Cliff Foggo, told Coastal View: “Working with the Council Engineering Department all procedures were investigated on how to repair the Skelton Industrial Estate roads. The legal aspects came to a dead end due to the owning company being in administration. As all that was required was patching of the potholes it was decided, as a safety issue, to repair the roads as a one off action but taking no responsibility for any future problems. The cost of the repairs would be Continued on page 6 ►►►
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