The New Town and Broughton Community Council has submitted a detailed objection to an Experimental Traffic Regulation Order (TRO/21/27B) seeking the retention of many of the measures introduced in 2021 under the Spaces for People initiative along the route from Canonmills to Broughton Street. These were intended to be a temporary response to the pandemic. We believe that there is no longer a justification to retain many of these measures or continue to evaluate them using an ETRO. Instead, those that are no longer serving a useful purpose should be removed immediately and those that have proven their value should be made permanent. The temporary measures do not properly support increased active travel and have created additional hazards for pedestrians, cyclists and other road users as well as increasing congestion on a busy arterial route leading to more air pollution in a residential and local neighbourhood area.
We also highlighted that the plans provided with the ETRO only provide information on the waiting and loading restrictions. Very limited information is provided on the actual measures which were the reason for introducing the revised waiting and loading restrictions. This makes it very difficult for members of the public to provide meaningful feedback on the ETRO.
No evidence has been provided of any monitoring that has been undertaken while this ETRO has been in effect nor does the ETRO set out any plans for such monitoring which is one of the stated reasons for continuing to have these temporary measures in place.
The original Spaces for People measures and their subsequent retention using the ETRO has been a missed opportunity to address the concerns raised by local residents and businesses. We have urged the Council to look again at the active travel needs of this neighbourhood area with a new perspective that properly responds to the needs of the community.
If you are interested in reading the full objection, please click on the link below
Broughton Street to Canonmills ETRO – NTBCC Objection
If you wish to make your own objection or add other comments, you can do so by email to TRO.Consultations@edinburgh.gov.uk. The deadline for comments is this Saturday, 15 February 2025.