A WALKING and cycle route through Burley, Ilkley and Addingham has come a step closer after councillors gave the go-ahead to a feasibility study.

Ilkley Parish Council had been asked to consider a spur from the Wharfedale Greenway, running from Burley through Ilkley and to Addingham.

A feasibility study from Sustrans will cost £12,000 and it had been anticipated that the parish council's share would be about £9,000.

But the study has been approved after councillors heard the cost to Ilkley would now be between £3,250 and £6,500.

The planned Wharfedale Greenway will create a series of off-road paths between Pool-in-Wharfedale, Menston, Otley and Burley. Supporters of the scheme say it bring transport, environmental, health, tourism and economic benefits to the communities of Wharfedale that it will link together.

The feasibility study is the first step in a process which could see the scheme extended out to Ilkley and Addingham.

A meeting of Ilkley Parish Council on Monday heard that Addingham Parish Council had agreed to pay about £2,000 towards the cost of the study while Burley was willing to pay £1,500. There is also a possibility of some funding from Bradford Council.

Cllr Henri Murison said: "I would like to propose that the council commits to £6,500 with the expectation that it may be less than that."

Chairman Cllr Brian Mann said: "I think it is important that we go ahead."

Councillors voted to approve the spending on the feasibility study.

In September Cllr Claire Darling urged the parish council to “get on” with approving the feasibility study and described the cost as “peanuts” compared to the benefits that would come from the scheme.

“I think it is something we should seek to advance and this seems to be the way to advance it,” she said.

At that meeting councillors were given a presentation on the subject by Sustrans, and representative Mike Babitt told the meeting if the scheme did go ahead, funding was likely to come from a number of sources.

The communities of Otley, Burley-in-Wharfedale, Menston and Pool-in-Wharfedale have been working on the scheme, to produce a walking and cycling route along the old railway line, for more than three years.

The first stage of the Greenway is expected to cost up to £2.5 million.