Warning of railfreight depot's 'massive impact' (From St Albans & Harpenden Review)

Warning of railfreight depot's 'massive impact'

1:15pm Thursday 1st July 2004 in News By Alex Lewis

CAMPAIGNERS are warning a proposed railfreight terminal near Park Street will have a huge impact on St Albans and are preparing to fight it tooth and nail.

The pressure group Lorries Out Of Park Street (Loops) says the issue is far more important than its original objective of getting a by-pass for the village and St Albans MP Kerry Pollard, who has pledged to help fight the proposal, has warned it has government sympathy.

Mrs Cath Bolshaw of Burydell Lane, Park Street, said: "We are looking at something a quarter of the size of St Albans.

"It will have a massive impact.

"It is the whole south-east corner of St Albans."

If the terminal is built on the disused aerodrome east of Park Street, goods will be arriving there by rail, but will need transferring by road to destinations all over north London and the northern Home Counties.

It would include extensive sidings large enough for long trains, rail-connected warehousing and machinery for loading and unloading containers perhaps as many containers as 150,000 a year.

Campaigners fear this will mean thousands more lorries on already congested local roads such as the A414 North Orbital Road and the A5183 through Park Street and Frogmore.

They argue that the knock-on effect on traffic will spread to the whole of St Albans.

Other objections include the loss of open Green Belt land and doubts over the capacity of the St Albans to London railway line for hundreds of extra freight trains without disrupting commuter services.

Loops fears the terminal could occupy not just the former airfield but would spread east of the railway line and south of the M25 motorway, although this is denied by the would-be developer, Helios Properties PLC.

The Government wants to shift freight from road to rail, which is safer and far more environmentally friendly in terms of reducing congestion and pollution and the Strategic Rail Authority wants new terminals where trains can be unloaded and goods stored.

The airfield site, which is flat and next to both the motorway and the railway, appears an ideal location.

Parts of the area are being quarried for gravel, but this is likely to end towards the end of next year and the extraction company Lafarge is backing the railfreight project.

The first step in the planning process to win approval for a terminal would be an environmental impact assessment and Helios Properties has asked St Albans District Council what aspects such as traffic impact, noise, landscape and ecology this should cover.

The assessment will be a lengthy document taking many months to prepare, but if Helios can draw up a plan that appears to answer the problems it raises, not least traffic, the firm will submit an application.

Spokesman Simon Hoare said: "Until we know what we have to do, we can't put a time-frame on it."

The company is planning to meet the Loops campaigners and says it will embark on a public consultation, probably shortly before the application is submitted, to seek the local people's views and answer their concerns.

It is likely to offer to fund a by-pass or link road and says it will include green open space with public access as part of the project.

Loops says a by-pass is no longer needed as most of the lorries leaving the industrial estates in Colney Street now join the M25 via Harper Lane rather than Park Street, but it is determined to fight the railfreight project.

A railfreight terminal could bring hundreds of new jobs, but objectors argue this is of dubious benefit in an area of very low unemployment and workers driving in will cause yet more congestion.

They are not opposed to any development of the former airfield, but would prefer to see a limited number of houses, with the rest landscaped as public open space.

Loops campaigners have been to Daventry in Northamptonshire to photograph a railfreight terminal there and the group is planning meetings and publicity stunts to mobilise opposition in advance of any planning application.

A similar proposal to build a railfreight terminal at Colnebrook near Heathrow Airport was defeated after a public inquiry two years ago and Loops contacted the successful campaigners to discuss tactics.

That planning battle cost the would-be developer £10 million in costs and in a bid to avoid a repetition, firms including Helios have joined forces in a consortium, the Rail Interchange Investment Group.

Representatives have been lobbying politicians and civil servants and have met officials from Hertfordshire County Council, whose role is likely to be crucial as it owns much of the land.

If the project gets as far as a public inquiry, the impact on the St Albans area is likely to be set against the wider benefits to the country as a whole of getting freight off the roads.