I don't know much about Samuel Beckett's play Waiting for Godot, but I do know, somebody gets a beating, someone else goes blind and then denies something ever happened, oh and Godot never comes.
If you are interested like I am in seeing less congestion and more active and sustainable travel in Harrogate, waiting for Godot is a fair metaphor for the process we seem to be perpetually engaged in.
As a town our residents and various local governments talk a great deal about the great things we will do to fix the congestion, we all agree is a problem. We also agree things would be much better if people (some of which let's be honest are us), didn't drive everywhere all the time.
Grand plans are formed, they get funded by central government due in part to their eloquence, detail and perhaps also the fact it's a tory central government funding a tory council's plans. They then get modified by North Yorkshire County Council's Highways department because of, trees or drains or because, well you know stuff. Usually they are diluted sometimes improved, but they change.
Highways then begin the process through their lead actor come public facing sage - Councillor Don Mackenzie Executive member for the 1970's (who communicates mostly through a column in the local paper bizarrely), of setting a series of dates when these schemes will not be implemented.
Godot is always due but he never quite gets here. We countdown, we wait, we hear footsteps but, no not quite, not yet, soon. Godot's failed arrival is greeted by a new date for his non arrival, tantalisingly close but still beyond our grasp, on we go, on, on, on.
In the play there are only two acts. I imagine the audience wouldn't stomach any more. In reality we have had as many as six dates for when the Otley Road cycle way won't be implemented. Four dates for the Beech Road scheme to fail to be enacted and we await dates for when Knaresborough Road, Oatlands Avenue and Victoria Avenue won't be improved for cyclists. The pedestrianisation of James Street may not happen as soon as nowish although it may not happen up to and including next May.
Remember these are things the council have agreed to do and have money allocated for, but not doing them is the only way to guarantee that current levels of congestion remain high and new dates for them not to happen can be set.
Soon (dates to be announced), we will be not be implementing a Park and Ride, not looking at how we can give buses priority on the A59 and A61 in town and we won't be building a bypass through Killinghall.
The lights dim and the characters remain on stage
"But that is not the question. What are we doing here, that is the question. And we are blessed in this, that we happen to know the answer. Yes, in the immense confusion one thing alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come -- ”
― Waiting for Godot
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