YEP Letters: May 11

Building work will start on a new £150m multi-storey college campus in Leeds city centre’s booming cultural quarter this summer after contracts were officially signed this week. The £150m scheme put forward by Leeds City College was given the go-ahead last November. This week the college announced it has officially signed the contracts to purchase land at Quarry Hill. Part-funded by the college the project has received £33.4m investment through the Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership (LEP) growth deal – a £1 billion package of government investment. Here’s what YEP readers think about the scheme..

Brandon Fox

One thing we really need is affordable housing, council housing, not office blocks and educational buildings. I’m university educated, live in a private house and think education is paramount, but so is cheaper social housing, not just for now, but for the future generations too. It’s fine that my children can go to university down the road, but where will they live? Hotels?

Gaynor Louise Bainbridge

What is wrong with the ones already there? That money needs to go into resurfacing roads, homeless care, etc not a new building where education prices will be upped to cover the cost.

Scott Taylor

Can’t believe how much people moan about all the new plans for Leeds city centre, the place looks amazing, such a great mix of old and new buildings. I live in Newcastle, come up here and have a look at this city centre, nothing ever gets built.

Nick Bell

This site has sat empty for years. It’s a prime city centre site and was never going to accommodate affordable housing. Leeds City Council has already committed to building 66,000 homes, is that not enough? This includes a massive east Leeds extension around Crossgates and Seacroft, just look at how good progress is at the moment.

We have a number of sites that have sat empty for decades now with planning in. The old British gas building is to become a Hilton hotel, with new buildings behind, York Road library that has sat empty for over 40 years has planning in to become a gym, many empty sites prone to vandalism and crime are getting developed. How is that a bad thing?

Leeds is clearly having a building boom and why would anyone want to stand in the way of that?

Andy Baylis

Every time something new is announced there are the moaners. So you want a council house you think everyone 
else shouldn’t be allowed anything?

The council builds council houses, private investment builds for everyone else. People actually want state of the art educational facilities, hotels, offices, private homes, restaurants, bars, shops. If you don’t like them, don’t use them, there are millions that do.

The council are building several thousand new homes. You can’t stop the development of a city on one issue you have an interest in. Twenty three new hotels are expected over the next few years. Why? Because they are needed as this city expands and develops and provides a future for our children, jobs, opportunities etc. Time to stop going on about social housing, it’s not an issue.

Theresa Burgess

As far as I know this building is for further education courses i.e school leavers and adults up to level 3 and not higher education. Leeds City College’s higher education campus is up near Park Lane campus.

If you’ve ever visited the technology campus which this new building will replace, you would see it is far behind the times compared with many high schools in Leeds.

This is long overdue.

Richard Smith

There is a shortage of council houses but we still need private investment in construction and retail so on to give people jobs so people aren’t reliant on social housing.

Peter Boocock

Be interesting to see what the planning obligations, essentially the designated community payback, shall be for this project.

Eastgate traffic is going to get snarled up, again. Leeds Public Access site has the relevant documents as they currently stand. Expect to hear some more regards planning obligations later, they still have to settle those. Typically those funds go into housing and other budgets.

Peter 999, via website

Now all we need to do is plan a mass transit system to allow all the students to be able to get from Leeds, Bradford and the wider area to reach the new colleges. Obviously our city leaders will be well ahead of the game planning for the future in identifying the locations of the mass transit stations co-located with the new college.

I am not expecting a mass transit system anytime soon, but I am expecting our council to have at least thought about it and be looking 10 years hence.

After our city transformational new park and rides, there seems to be complete silence from the council regarding a mass transit system.

s1234_2, via website

Traffic at rush hour around this area is already bad enough, so one has to assume the council will now do their usual and slam in a bus lane on Regent Street.

Thanks for supporting BHF

Professor Mark Kearney, BHF funded researcher

I want to thank readers who have been supporting the British Heart Foundation (BHF) this spring by decluttering and donating items from their clear out to their local BHF shop.

I work at The University of Leeds as a BHF Professor and wanted to tell your readers about my current research project, funded by the BHF.

My team is developing new treatments for people with diabetes and working to better understand the link between diabetes and heart disease.

One of our main focuses is examining new ways of repairing damaged blood vessels. This work could lead to the discovery of new treatments for diabetic patients and help prevent the development of heart disease in the future.

My project is just one of over 1,000 research projects that the BHF currently funds at universities across the UK, investigating every aspect of heart and circulatory disease – from causes and better drugs to improving surgical techniques.

Each of these projects are only made possible by the BHF’s generous supporters and each unwanted item donated this spring brings us one step closer to the next big breakthrough in heart research.

I cannot thank the people of Yorkshire and the Humber enough for helping to support such an important and worthy cause. There are currently 616,000 people living with cardiovascular disease across the area and I’m sure every reader will have been touched by heart disease in some way or another whether it be personally, through a family member or close friend.

If you are yet to have your clear out or would like to support your local BHF shop at other times of the year, they are always in need of items to fill their rails and shelves so please do keep them in mind for you unwanted items.

To find your local shop, order free donation bags or find out more about the free home collection service, please visit bhf.org.uk/bagit

Let us know what you think

THE Yorkshire Evening Post wants you to share your views with other readers.

Whether you’re commenting on a local topic, a national story or international affairs, please join the debate.

Email [email protected] or write to The Editor, Readers’ Letters, Yorkshire Evening Post, No 1 Leeds, 26 Whitehall Road, Leeds LS12 1BE and please keep letters under 300 words.