Plans to spend up to £100 million of taxpayers' money on a link road to Leeds Bradford Airport have been scrapped.
Leeds City Council says it has abandoned the link road plans due to a "lack of clear support" during two public consultations, but it will press ahead with a project to build a parkway train station in Cookridge, near the airport.
The council wants to build the station on the Leeds to Harrogate line by 2023 and construct a 350-space car park and park and ride facilities, as well as a spur road that links the station and the airport.
There are also plans to build a new road from the A658 to a patch of land that has been earmarked for the North West Leeds Employment Hub – where a range of businesses offering a total of 5,500 jobs could soon be built.
The new station would facilitate the controversial expansion of the privately run airport, which is looking to increase passenger numbers from 4 million to 7 million by 2030.
Cllr Lisa Mulherin, the council's executive member for climate change and transport, said: "The lack of clear support for any of the (link road) options has been consistent so it is only right that we have listened and are responding to what people are telling us they do want.
"That is why we are taking forward proposals for a parkway station, investing in sustainable public transport infrastructure.
“This will help to take cars off the roads travelling into the city centre from the north of the city and provide public transport links to the existing airport facility and the new North West Leeds Employment Hub to support the demand for new jobs in that part of the city.”
Cllr Mulherin has refused to say whether the Labour-run council, which has declared a climate emergency, supports the expansion of the airport.
But she says there needs to be "a national strategy" for reducing aviation emissions "so all cities and regions are on a level playing field".
She has also written to transport secretary Grant Shapps to call for aviation emissions to be factored in to the national targets for carbon reduction.
Aviation emissions have not be factored into the carbon reduction targets set by Leeds City Council, which has promised to ensure Leeds emits no more than 42 megatonnes of CO2 from all sources, between 2018 and 2050. This is known as Leeds' 'carbon budget'.
Earlier this year, climate scientists from University of Leeds found that the flights alone by 2035, even if all other sources of carbon emissions in the city had been shut down in 2018.
Cllr Mulherin said: "We absolutely need to have a national focus in terms of carbon reduction from aviation and a national aviation strategy.
"Currently, what we have are local regions and cities having to look at this issue in isolation and you can't do that with aviation.
"The council recognises the work being done by the Leeds Climate Commission, which has made it very clear that the growth in aviation nationally as well as locally is incompatible with our carbon targets."
The council says plans for the new station and road "only became possible" after the government agreed to hand Leeds a £173.5 million transport grant, but no budget has been set for these plans yet.
Cllr Kim Groves, chair of the West Yorkshire Combined Authority Transport Committee, said: “Developing a new railway station on the Leeds-Harrogate line will provide a low carbon alternative for travel to the airport, help reduce congestion and improve air quality while also supporting economic growth by connecting to the North West Leeds Employment Hub.
“We are working to help people across the region to switch from cars to public transport, cycling and walking and this approach is at the centre of our £500 million plus bid to the government’s Transforming Cities Fund to help make clean, affordable, sustainable travel available to all."
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