Marvellous. Add it to the pile that are on S/tudent/lateford road with more planned...
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » General Edinburgh
"DIY store to be demolished for student flats" (and other developments)
(385 posts)-
Posted 8 years ago #
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It's off to Homebase at Craigleith or one of the out-of-town Barns at Straiton / Hermiston Gait / Newcraighall if you can't find what you need at Screwfix.
I've already become pretty good at going all the way to B&Q at Hermiston Gate. At least it has bike parking.
Posted 8 years ago # -
I suppose it was inevitable, but what a shame. luckily we don't seem to manage to do much diy anymore...
Posted 8 years ago # -
B&Q kindly sent me this email:
"Powderhall store will be closing on 3rd September 2016 so there’s only a short time left to purchase B&Q products at remarkable prices in our closing down sale^. You’ll find our usual great products, services and deals at our nearby stores Edinburgh New Craighall and Hermiston Gait."
Now I know where Hermiston Gait is but even their website doesn't know where New Craighall is. ;-D
edit: On reflection the previous name for Fort Kinnaird might have contained the space, although B&Q still refer to this shop as Newcraighall everywhere else.
Posted 8 years ago # -
Oh damnation! That really annoys me.
Better get a list together of all the DIY and garden stuff I need, pronto!
Posted 8 years ago # -
"
DEVELOPERS will build a 250-bed student complex on the site, complete with a private dining area, movie room and a full-sized gym.
The accommodation – due to be completed in September 2018 – will also boast large social areas, a gaming zone and study rooms.
Vita Student insist that they understand the history of the site is special to the community and has pledged to host open evenings to allow people to see its evolution.
"
Posted 8 years ago # -
Really is becoming student central on Fountainbridge.
Posted 8 years ago # -
Vita Student insist that they understand the history of the site is special to the community and has pledged to host open evenings to allow people to see its evolution.
I sincerely doubt people care how it evolves. They were emotionally attached to the memories when it was dance hall not how much of a student battery is becomes. I also suspect they didn't much care about its time as a bingo hall or a damp, rotting, stinking ruin either. Good riddance as far as I'm concerned if people really cared about it they should have done something 20 years ago when it started to fall apart.
Posted 8 years ago # -
There's a lot of old nostalgia (40 years old at least) attached to the place, and it holds an important place in many peoples memories. But as you say it's been abandoned for 10 years and spent 30 years before that as a rather forgotten about Bingo club, and the Bingo industry have been very poor stewards of all the cinemas they took over in the 1960s; running them into the ground then abandoning them for purpose-built places when it no longer became economically viable to keep them going.
Architecturally, the Palais / New Coliseum was a rather cheap, ugly and functional place and not at all notable. If we can't as a city make the Odeon/New Victoria or Caley/Picture House work as entertainment venues, we were never going to be able to do something at Fountainbridge.
I think there's certainly a real problem with our inability to use brownfield land like this for more useful purposes for keeping a community balanced, like building houses that people can settle down in and actually afford to live in.
Or we can keep hollowing out the centre of Edinburgh and developing sites for transient populations of students or high-end flats for property speculators.
Posted 8 years ago # -
Thought it was time to actually picture the development that started this thread!
Posted 8 years ago # -
"There's a lot of old nostalgia (40 years old at least) attached to the place"
Posted 8 years ago # -
Walked past the building work by the old homebase last night, it's coming along very quickly. It's a shame that homebase had to go, but they are managing to get a lot of rooms (581 beds) in a city centre location which is surely good.
I tried to look up the price for a studio, they've all sold out but the ones on Bernard terrace around the corner are going for 224 quid per week. Madness...
Posted 7 years ago # -
£224 a week for a studio????
Is it any wonder there is a buoyant market in rental flats for students ?
Posted 7 years ago # -
Not for students this time.
"
A FORMER B&Q site is to be turned into nearly 200 new homes in an effort to reinvigorate an abandoned site overlooking the Water of Leith.
"
Posted 7 years ago # -
“reinvigorate" mmmm
Posted 7 years ago # -
A new urban eyesore: Britain's shamefully shoddy student housing
Free to ignore building standards for dwellings, student housing isn’t just ruining British cities – it’s damaging student life. As universities start back, we reveal how developers get away with it
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/11/britains-shamefully-shoddy-student-housing
Posted 7 years ago # -
The developers can get away with such things, because student housing doesn’t officially classify as housing. It falls into the murky category of “sui generis” (Latin for “of its own kind”). As it falls outside a specific use class, it doesn’t have to adhere to the usual standards associated with dwellings (class C3).
That doesn't seem right.
Posted 7 years ago # -
There's a 400-bed place just opening up off Bothwell Street (possibly one of the dirtiest, most dog-pooped and fly-tipped streets in Leith, and certainly up there for antisocial but perfectly legal parking).
It remains to be seen if this will bring a vibrant cafe culture to Bothwell Street or exacerbate the problems faced by the most densely populated part of Scotland.
Posted 7 years ago # -
The proposed student development on Russell Road was recommended for rejection; no doubt it will reappear in a slightly different form shortly.
Posted 7 years ago # -
"There's a 400-bed place just opening up off Bothwell Street "
I've a prime view of this block from the kitchen window. It's open, students have moved in over the past week. We'll see how it goes but already noted that the promised opening of a route to Sunnyside has not happened: old iron gates still very much closed on Saturday...
TBH I'm less fussed about this student block than the oversized grey tower adjacent in the Urbane Den development, which is out of scale with the surrounding buildings.
Posted 7 years ago # -
TBH I'm less fussed about this student block than the oversized grey tower adjacent in the Urbane Den development
That's just the first of 3 matching buildings, the next one going up is in the south wedge of the old triangle of railway lines, pointing towards the bridge under London Road.
Posted 7 years ago # -
"That's just the first of 3 matching buildings"
Yeah, the whole development there is truly awful.
Posted 7 years ago # -
Another student block is being built in Abbeyhill. This time on Stanley Place, which some may recall was the site of a mysterious and very convenient fire a few years ago.
Developers got permission after appealing the initial refusal apparently. Planning portal reference 14/05075/FUL Demolition has apparently started this week.
The area will get even busier now, with more pressure on local services such as GP practices. My main concern with the student accommodation epidemic is that the area becomes full of transient residents with no real stake in the community. On the positive side students who can afford to stay in these blocks tend to be reasonably trouble free neighbours.
I note from the plans that the flats are all studios with their own kitchens. That's luxury student accommodation, not shared flats with communal kitchens as in some others. There's a gym, but hardly any car parking and lots of cycle storage indicates most are expected to cycle or use public transport.
Given experience of other similar developments including nearby Brae House, the main problem will be when the students are away during the summer, and the building inevitably becomes an aparthotel for tourists and/or Fringe performers/technical crews. The surrounding streets will be awash with their (illegally) parked vehicles and the area will seem suddenly much busier.
Posted 7 years ago # -
Think Silk / Gaia/ Stereo was featured in TS2?
Part of the city's heritage ;-) The Castle Street car park will be next and that is a key location in the film!
Posted 6 years ago # -
"They" would never get away with knocking down a car park, knock down all the pubs, clubs and other fun venues but the great people of Edinburgh will fight to keep their city centre car park.
Posted 6 years ago # -
“
But not all the new arrivals are so welcome. “Lots of student accommodation gets built too with a Sainsbury’s underneath,” says James. “They’re hubs and they don’t use local amenities.
“
Posted 6 years ago # -
Here we go again. Edinburgh turning into a giant student dormitory...
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Edinburgh arts base under threat from £15m student flats deal
THE Capital’s biggest independent arts complex is under threat after landlords flogged its base to developers for £15m.
The new owners of former government building St Margaret’s House, in London Road, want to turn it into affordable housing, student flats and “facilities for the benefit of the local community”.
Posted 6 years ago #
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