Park Street rail freight: Eric Pickles will not reconsider (From St Albans & Harpenden Review)

Rail freight: Eric Pickles will not reconsider

12:55pm Friday 8th February 2013 in News By Zoe Forsey, Senior Reporter

The secretary of state has said that he will not reconsider his decision on the rail freight terminal in Park Street, despite the district council threatening to take legal action against it.

St Albans District Council wrote to Eric Pickles’ department on January 18 after he announced he was minded to grant planning permission in December.

However, yesterday the council received a letter from the Treasury Solicitor’s Department saying that the plans are lawful and will not be reconsidered.

In September last year Mr Pickles agreed to look at the rail freight plans in conjunction with a similar appeal in Colnbrook in Slough.

However he went against this in December and decided not to call them in for reconsideration.

The council, which was unable to provide a comment today, will continue to seek legal advice on how to deal with the situation.