Actions and decisions are red italic. ND (‘no dissent’) means that no-one spoke or voted against a decision.
Edinburgh Council has stated that ‘CCs can approve minutes, and take other decisions, remotely’, as so long as they ensure that ‘remote meetings are as accessible to members of the public and (as) well-advertised as possible’. Continue reading
As noted below, the New Town and Broughton Community Council (NTBCC) considers the consultation to be deeply flawed. The inclusion of questions about measures not yet implemented is highly questionable. Until there has been an opportunity to evaluate the success or otherwise of any particular measures, it is impossible to make any valid judgment on whether they should be retained or removed. Many of the questions group cycling and walking together but the needs of these two groups are quite different making it impossible to properly judge the merits of specific measures for each of these groups. The survey is designed to encourage simple yes/no answers to questions about whether measures should be retained and does too little to obtain any insight into the consequences both favourable and otherwise from the implementation of the measures. The Commonplace Mapping tool would have been a far more effective means of obtaining genuine and considered feedback on the various measures that have been introduced. This lack of qualitative feedback will hamper any decision making by Council officials and Councillors. Edinburgh Council and its citizens deserve better than this hastily prepared and poorly designed survey.
With regard to the specific schemes already implemented in our area:
Minutes of the Community Councils Together on Trams/Trams Team meeting
(Construction Phase) via Google Meet on Thursday 25 February 2021 at 5:30pm Continue reading
NTBCC has published the following leaflet on Broughton St. It connects with these previous posts:
Click either image below to see the full PDF. The text of the PDF is reproduced below.
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The Council have just announced (see separate post) the temporary Spaces for People measures that will be implemented along the route from Canonmills to Broughton Street. While we welcome some aspects of the current plans including the widening of the pavements at the Broughton Road junction and the improvements made to a number of junctions along the route, we intend to highlight our disappointment with the overall package of measures. The current proposals largely ignore the feedback from the Commonplace Mapping conducted last year and make few meaningful improvements to pedestrian and cyclist safety.
NTBCC has submitted a deputation to Edinburgh Council’s Transport and Environment Committee meeting on 19 February 2021. This deputation responds to the City Mobility Plan. NTBCC also submitted, as an attachment, its response to the consultation in 2020. Click the following links to see
For both of these, the text of the documents precedes a link to the original PDF.
Cities are moulded by intricate networks of historic, social, economic and technological inter-relationships. Successful places are those which adapt positively and effectively to meet new challenges. So proposed interventions, however well intentioned, must fully examine, analyse, understand and build positively on this complexity, rather than being isolated responses to pressure from one particular interest group or issue. Edinburgh has a very distinctive character and it is rare that undigested schemes, uncritically imposed from elsewhere, can produce satisfactory results.
Broughton Street is a typical example of a historic highway. Originally the main street of Broughton village outside Edinburgh’s walls, from the 12th century it was also part of the ‘Wester Road’, until Leith Walk was built in 1650, through Bonnington to Leith.
As Edinburgh spread the street was absorbed into the expanding city, reinforcing its role as a community hub for the surrounding area with housing, retailing, pubs and cafés, and at one time also with sixteen religious institutions directly on the street or close by. Later public transport, first as trams and then buses, was routed through it. Many of the shops were of a quality which draw customers from beyond the immediate vicinity. As with most inner-city residential areas, it had experienced a period of decay but has now come back strongly.
Today, it plays multiple roles – as a highway, as a public transport corridor, as a pedestrian place for shopping and leisure, as a residential street, and above all as a high-quality community high street for local residents and those beyond, which contrasted with and complemented the chain stores and larger-scale retail offering of the adjacent city centre, in the same manner as Stockbridge or William Street catered for their localities. Continue reading