Morning Leeds! Here’s Friday’s roundup.
It has been announced that money is to be spent on the rail system, with some benefit to Leeds.
The plan includes £13.6m to spend on new platforms at Leeds and £10m to expand capacity at Harrogate as well as improvements at Halifax and Huddersfield and new track at Micklefield allowing trains to be turned around.
Although… isn’t that roughly the same amount of money earmarked for the South Entrance? Oh, and hilariously Harrogate isn’t actually getting any improvement, as reported in the Northern Echo yesterday. Whoops.
The Council is encouraging people to follow @LeedsTravelInfo for travel info on all methods of transport, including walking and cycling. Includes walking! Presumably it’ll say things like “it’s snowing, so wear sensible shoes #gritting” or “watch out for the #pothole on #woodhouselane that’s still not been filled in yet #cycling”.
If you look carefully, you can spot the new branding for West Riding House. Bit of a negative article (although I’d hardly expect otherwise from Rod McPhee), but it looked pretty awful before with some letters not lit up, so any refurb should be positive.
There’s two new supporters for the campaign to keep the Leeds children’s heart surgery unit open. First, Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu and second, scriptwriter and director Kay Mellor.
Is it… can it be? Might we get some snow this weekend? Time to find the gloves and thick socks.
Wrap-up Leeds might be a good idea, in that case. It’s a great scheme (we were lucky enough to be insulated last year and it really makes a difference) and people should take advantage of it.
The Council has given the go-ahead for music events at Headingley cricket ground. A good idea? A catastrophic one? Residents – not students, but the people who live there – will probably think the latter.
There’s an opportunity to walk part of the Leeds-Liverpool Canal… in the canal. This actually happens relatively frequently and you can find out about bits of the canal open through the Canal and River Trust.
We’re obviously not classy enough as we have no idea what a D&D restaurant is, but from the point of view of putting Leeds on the map, it’s good that this is their first one in the UK outside London.
Finally today, there’s a talk about dinosaurs at Cafe Scientifique at Leeds Museum on Sunday. There’s nothing finer than a chat about dinosaurs on a Sunday morning.
Later on today we have Leeds Book Club’s monthly article about literature and culture in Leeds for the rest of the month – stay tuned for that one! And we’ll be back on Monday with our usual collection of eclectic news and views. Have a great weekend!
Beyond Guardian Leeds 