Congestion crunch time

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"Congestion does not come for free," said the leader of Manchester city council, Sir Richard Leese, at a debate last night ahead of the city's long-awaited congestion charge referendum. Well, I think it does come for free, but wouldn't it be rather better to pay a little to solve it?

Mancunians received their first ballot packs through the post this week, so that question's answer is the talk of the town. Leese was, of course, referring to the knock-on effects to businesses, schools and other institutions of people sitting in a traffic jam on the A5103 Princess Parkway. However, this kind of obtuse "cost to business" rhetoric never washes with the great unwashed, a sizeable number of whom like their cars, thank you very much, and don't want to slum it on the Metrolink standing three inches away from a coughing splutterer with dubious personal hygiene.

Leese clashed with two attack dogs from the No campaign as well as 100 invited Manchester Evening News readers during a two-hour showdown broadcast on Manchester's local TV station Channel M. His argument was clear: Manchester were being asked to choose between a "revolution" in trams, buses and trains that would transform the capital and "absolutely nothing". The No campaign were quick to point out that the latter also costs absolutely nothing. The Yes-men (and women, for want of a better term) appealed to Manchester's maverick, independent and practical spirit. "[Manchester] has never been a place that has sat on its hands," said Lis Phelan, the leading Yes-woman.

"Until now the dream of overhauling our entire public transport system has been just that - a dream," she said. "Now we are one vote away from having 90% of our population just five minutes' walk away from a bus running every 20 minutes during the day. Have you any idea what difference that would make to the 30% of people in Greater Manchester who don't have a car?"

She was referring to the aforementioned "revolution" in public transport, with a £2.75bn war chest promised to provide a 10% increase in buses, new orbital and cross-city routes, 100 extra school buses, a Metrolink extension to the city's south, and new carriages on trains.

Graham Stringer MP, Leese's predecessor as council chief, told the audience the scheme's huge reliance on debt - £1.2bn would be borrowed and paid back over 30 years from the profits of the congestion charge - was unsustainable. "It seems to me the models in terms of the economy are crackers," he said. "If you're in doubt about the outcome, vote no because you will be stuck with it for a third of a century if you get it wrong."

The congestion-busting proposals would impose two ringed zones around the city centre from 2013 and charge motorists up to £5 to enter or exit at peak times from 2013. This would be offset by £3bn of public transport improvements.

Judging by the automatic line added to every email I get from one of my close friends - VOTE NO TO THE MANCHESTER C-CHARGE! - he's dead against it. But then again, he is a travelling booze salesman who's speeding up and down the M56 peddling his wares in country pubs, so maybe that's not surprising. The real battle lies in winning the hearts and minds of city centre commuters. Counting of the postal-only ballots begins on December 12. It's going to be a hard-fought next few weeks.

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Regular readers will know I like to point out newfangled gizmos and gadgets that northern newspaper sites have come up with try to rival the local news behemoth that is the BBC. The Liverpool Echo's crime map of Liverpool is particularly nifty, while the Wigan Evening Post's running blog on the town's Big Brother contestant wasn't really my cup of tea, but I'm sure it appealed to the switched-on "yoof" demographic so desired by advertisers.

This week, I've been loving the daily blog from Peter Barron, the editor of the Northern Echo. Editors' blogs are a good idea (and one we've tried ourselves - http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/insideguardian) as it gives you a pretty good insight - for better or worse - into what makes a newspaper tick.

Barron, however, seems to have been obsessed this week by what he believes to be serious editorial failures at the local radio station TFM, specifically its failure to award his organ top prize in its daily headline competition. I'll pass you over to Barron, who'll give you the lowdown:

"WHAT have you got to do to win a point on The Headline Game? This morning's story for the daily battle on TFM was about a woman who's given up teaching to become the first female tree feller in Hamsterley Forest.

"Our quite brilliant headline was: 'She's a jolly good feller - and saw say all of us.'

"Graham Mack The Knife [I'm assuming he's a local radio celeb] and his team of cohorts came up with the distinctly ordinary 'Chopping and changing' and gave themselves the point.

"It's what you call a traves-tree of justice."

Boom-boom.

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"Can you help solve strange fish mystery?"

When a story is given a headline such as this, how can you fail to mutter under your breath: "Well, I'll have a darn good go at it, yes."

A visitor to Whitby, Ritchie Symmonds, from Grantham, told the local Gazette: "While walking on the beach between Whitby and Sandsend I came across the washed-up body of a strange fish. I have tried to identify it, but failed miserably."

Symmonds even sent a picture of his mystery find, which has handily been posted on the website for all you fish fetishists.

The secretary of the Whitby Charter Fishermen's Association, Jon Whitton, saved the day. "It's almost certainly some kind of sea bream - there are black bream and white bream but they are much rarer in the north although there was quite an invasion of them in 1969 and in the early 1970s.

Thanks Jon.

ALFRED HICKLING RECOMMENDS

Northern Art Prize, Leeds City Art gallery, now until February 1.

The prize is open to any professional artist working in the north-west, north-east and Yorkshire - as defined by Arts Council England. So if you live in Derby, bad luck. Dundee? Way too northern. Competitors must live in the region and can only be nominated by art world professionals. The selection panel, meanwhile, is based entirely in London. Make of that what you will.

This year's quartet of finalists features two Liverpudlians, Imogen Stidworthy and Paul Rooney, along with Richard Forster from Saltburn and Leeds' own Clare Charnley.