Given that cement production is about 8% of global CO2 emissions, I 'suspect' preventing its unnecessary use to facilitate harebrained governmental policies and poor transport choices is absolutely a part of solving the climate emergency.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » General Edinburgh
"Hospital workers face car parking ban at ERI"
(140 posts)-
Posted 2 years ago #
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Before there was a good local hospital system, and most people that currently travel to the ERI would never have had to before when it was in the City Centre...
Posted 2 years ago # -
Well said Muran. I suspect most of these justifications for driving is using sick people, key workers and hard-pressed visitors as emotional blackmail to achieve an end of their own selfish convenience.
Posted 2 years ago # -
@MB You are completely missing my point that 20 years ago most people didn't need to go to the ERI for most traetment, they went to their local hospital...
Stop the journeys, not the parking. If people don't have to travel 60 miles after work they don't need to drive.
maybe it was 30 years ago, i forget how long it's been there.
Posted 2 years ago # -
most people that currently travel to the ERI would never have had to before when it was in the City Centre
What do you mean "would never have had to travel"? Unless they were living in flats above the RIE, almost everyone would have had to travel, be it by foot, bike, cart, canal barge or omnibus.
Posted 2 years ago # -
"almost everyone would have had to travel, be it by foot, bike, cart, canal barge or omnibus"
Not from Fife, and Livingston, and Polbeth, and Caldercruix, and Whitburn, they would have went to St John's or Kirkcaldy for most treatment, not the ERI.
Poeple local to Edin went to the ERI, with a few exceptions for specialist treatment.
Building a Mega hospital, or centralisation has resulted in all of these people needing to go to Edinburgh that never had to before.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Medicine has changed utterly since cottage hospitals provided a cleanly place to croak, with little in the way of treatment options (sorry if that sounds harsh). Studies have proven that specialisation/'centres of excellence' deliver better outcomes.
Anecdotally, I grew up in a rural part of Northern Ireland - the local county town had a hospital, which occasionally came on the radar for closure, eliciting protests. Yet if anyone felt they had a serious illness, the folk wisdom was to bypass it and go straight to Belfast for treatment, which was probably wise. It can't be had both ways...
Posted 2 years ago # -
St John's still has most if not all services?
https://www.nhslothian.scot/GoingToHospital/Locations/StJohnsHospital/Pages/default.aspx
Patients can be sent between the hospitals depending on beds/demand, but it's 2-way (I've been admitted to StJ having been sent there by my GP) - whole different issue there I guess
Caldercruix would be Monklands I imagine - can't imagine there ever was a proper hospital closer than Airdrie
No idea what the situation is in Fife.
Posted 2 years ago # -
As you discovered by googling, St John's not a wee place to croak. Though it has lost a lot of services, surgical, children's, and major A&E cases now transferred to Edin. As you say goes 2 ways, St John's has an excellent burns unit (originally from Bangour), so most v serious burns nationwide go there.
As you say not so bad if you are admitted, 1 journey each way (hopefully). But relatives doing 60 mile round trips visiting (any hospital) for weeks on end is mentally, and physically draining day in day out,twice a day at weekends without doubling the travel time on top of that for no reason, better to make it as easy as possible for them.
Posted 2 years ago # -
“It's only handy if you live in Niddrie.“
Well
Not too bad since they built the ‘bus only’ road, but that was years after the hospital was built.
A direct, flat, walk/cycle route was planned from Greendykes - which might have helped some people to get/get to jobs, but it was ‘feared’ some people might be more interested in parked cars…
Posted 2 years ago # -
BC, if I recall correctly you were in favour of banning physical commuting in favour of remote working and demolishing the centre of Edinburgh to make a park on another thread. But apparently unlimited daily car journeys to visit people in hospital is essential?
I stand by my point that allowing car drivers to park a car all day at an essential public amenity for less than a local return bus ticket is some of the worst demand management idiocy and signaling I've ever heard.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Yes, because in my personal experience you don't know if you'll see them again tomorrow.
Posted 2 years ago # -
‘Expansion’ was one of the reasons for the RIE becoming the ERI. ‘The plan’ was move sideways to Tollcross, demolishing a lot of houses.
Similarly the reason for the Burns Unit being in Livingston was that the ‘preferred site’ was also occupied by occupied housing.
Centralisation of services had similar logic to that which decided that ‘the future is cars’.
I do not know to what extent improvements in health outcomes can be proved to be related to ‘centralisation’/‘specialisation’ rather better knowledge/drugs/equipment/procedures - some of which may be improved with centralisation.
Of course health/illness might look different if more people walked/cycled more often…
Posted 2 years ago # -
"Western General has a Minor Injuries Unit, which is very very limited in what they can treat (I know this from experience). "
Yes, also been there a few times. It's like an A&E for minor injuries though, you can just rock up, no appointment required.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Changes in health care not just about hospitals -
“
This last day was in many ways symptomatic of the changes I have seen over the course of 30 years. Today, with advances of medicines and technology, patients are living longer, often with three or even four serious long-term conditions, so having one patient with heart failure, chronic respiratory problems, dementia and previous stroke is not at all unusual, whereas 30 years ago the heart failure might have carried them off in their 60s. This makes every patient much more complex, and it can be much harder to manage them and to get the balance of treatments right.
Today, unlike 30 years ago, all patients are strangers and, as my catchment area now extends into different London boroughs, even the places I go are unfamiliar. Gone is the relationship between my community and me. Instead, I am part of a gig economy, as impersonal as the driver delivering a pizza. I ended the shift with a profound sense of loss and sadness.
“
Posted 2 years ago # -
Whether or not services should be decentralised, the situation right now is what it is; when our kids were born they were not let out for a few days and it was very easy to drive there and pay to park. In contrast I hated going to St John's for certain clinics as it's impossible to park. The idea that uniquely parking should be subsidised for hospital staff and visitors is pernicious. Why not subsidise public transport, food, or energy bills for people who are in dire straits visiting loved ones in hospital? Only subsidising the half of the people who use a car (which is mostly the more wealthy half) seems perverse if the aim is to provide targeted support.
Posted 2 years ago # -
As people are already willing to drive around the site for 3 hours to get a parking space, there's no feasible amount of extra parking that can be built. Probably twice as many would drive there if you only had to wait an hour, which would still be a crazy situation. They urgently need to create an express shuttle bus that runs at all hours connecting people to town / the park and ride, and a protected cycle lane too.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Dave - yes. Unusually for a hospital, people are mistaking the symptoms (difficulty parking) with the cause of the issue (it's a difficult place to get to without a car for many people).
The solution must involve making the alternatives to driving the cheapest/easiest option for those that can make use of them, such as Edinburgh based visitors and out-patients or staff who work regular office hours.
Posted 2 years ago # -
There are also lots of targeted interventions that could be put in place. For example, parking could be made expensive but if you are referred to the ERI for ongoing specialist treatment and you live 60 miles away, we could just give those patients discounted parking. I bet if you look at the X thousand cars that enter the site, the huge majority of them have got a viable alternative (or could have for minimal investment in road infra).
Posted 2 years ago # -
More than half of the people commuting to the hospital from Liberton drive there.
(Assuming that everyone commuting to "Craigmillar" is going to the hospital, which won't be that far off being true).
Posted 2 years ago # -
"targeted interventions"
Conjestion charging for those coming in or out of Edinurgh on any route. On that route charge would start just a wee bit past the hospital on the Edinburgh side.
People that need to get to hospital who can't easily get there, out of town people can get there directly, disabled get free access through conjestion area etc.
Leave the hospital with free parking for those that need it.
Posted 2 years ago # -
free parking for those that need it
There won't be any spaces available for those that need it, if you make parking free. Simple laws of supply and demand.
As I said before, even if you build multiple multi-storeys, and a 27-lane highway, there still won't be available spaces and access capacity to cater for potential demand. What is wrong with using money to price things? We do it for everything else?
Posted 2 years ago # -
"What is wrong with using money to price things? We do it for everything else?"
You missed the earlier points about the parking having already been paid for by money.
However if Edinburgh residents (comments just above suggesting they are the ones using all of the parking) had to pay £10 congestion charge to get back into Edinburgh after using the carpark, would they just get the bus instead?
Seems then there would then be plenty parking for those that really need it...
Posted 2 years ago # -
Conjestion charging for those coming in or out of Edinurgh on any route. On that route charge would start just a wee bit past the hospital on the Edinburgh side.
This sounds like a congestion charge conveniently designed to suit you and only you
Posted 2 years ago # -
Would stop people coming into Edinburgh, isn't that what *you* crave?...
Posted 2 years ago # -
"suit you and only you"
Travelling a 70 mile round trip to get to the ERI doesn't suit me at all. I'd much rather it wasn't neccesary, and takes 4 hours out of my day visiting and getting there and home.
However if the Scottish government is going to make me drive half way round the country to visit critically ill relatives the least they can do is give me somewhere to park.
I wholeheartedly agree Edinburgh residents and those local should get the bus, or Ambulance.
Posted 2 years ago # -
You've got somewhere to park. Why don't you want to pay for it? This is freeloading, pure and simple
Posted 2 years ago # -
It has already been paid for (with actual real folding green stuff).
The trouble with the ultras is that nothing will make you happy, there is no middle ground for you. I've suggested removing cars from Edinburgh by congestion charge, not good enough for you. You litterally want everyone living in the woods in grass huts ;).
Posted 2 years ago # -
The critical difference is choice.
I'm happy to pay £10 for example to drive into Edinburgh, because I can choose not to do that.
If I have to drive half way round the country to visit a critically ill or dying relative in the ERI I have no choice but to do that, 1. because the Scottish Government has removed the local services which I used to cycle or bus too, and 2. loyalty to loved ones removes the choice, you have to go, wherever the hospital is for as long as they are there. Another personal example for me is driving to a hospice in Ayr and back every night after work for a week - that had free parking too.
I can only presume Neddie that the only considerations you have to make in life are for you alone, and that you don't have to worry about loyalty to ill relatives whilst managing work and familly life and visiting all in 24 hours etc - one day you might (we all do at some point), and it will become clearer. :)
Posted 2 years ago # -
Um
This is getting slightly personal, when it really need not.
Clearly everyone has ‘personal circumstances’ but the points here are about provision of parking (free or otherwise) at institutions which in themselves are heavily involved in ‘special cases’.
Using/needing hospitals is a bit random. I have no idea how much visits/admissions are emergencies or scheduled or how much the latter are 9-5.
I have no idea what proportion of visitors (for treatment, visiting patients or as workers) have cars or to what extent they want/prefer to use them.
Clearly ‘most people’ will never choose to cycle or walk (unless they stay close by), clearly PT needs to be better/better suited to actual needs of all visitors.
Unfortunately there have been decades of presumptions/policies about cars being best/inevitable etc.
Changing this for many reasons (inc. ‘Climate’) isn’t easy, but is necessary.
Creating more parking spaces is the wrong solution - not least because it won’t sort whatever the actual problems are.
Putting trains on the South Sub and having a station at Cameron Toll plus shuttle buses, should be a much higher priority than ‘sorting’ the Sheriffhall roundabout.
But…
Additionally, it’s really sad when the health establishment continues to ignore/play down healthier travel options - some of which might save the NHS money AND create a slightly healthier population.
Posted 2 years ago #
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