Picardy Place Redevelopment
Dear Councillor MacInnes,
I am writing to you both as my councillor and as chair of the Transport and Environment Committee in relation to the above development, the plans for which I viewed yesterday at the developer’s event in Multrees Walk.
The plans as presented are an insult to both Edinburgh and its citizens and a breach of the City of Edinburgh Council’s own Business Plan for 2017-2022.
My main objection to the plan is that it prioritises motor traffic and is essentially a proposal to construct a very unwelcome 1960s style gyratory system in the heart of our city.
The developer’s display claimed that the design gives priority to pedestrians, buses and cyclists. The method for determining which transport mode has priority is quite simple; determine which has the continuous, unbroken network and which has the greater surface area allocated to it. This design has;
1. Three continuous lanes for motor traffic,
2. narrow pavements disrupted by multiple pedestrian crossings,
3. no bus lanes at all and,
4. fragmented cycle lanes
This design therefore prioritises the movement of private motor vehicles.
The ‘Building for a Future Edinburgh’ section of your business plan requires that you;
15. Protect Edinburgh World Heritage Status and make sure developments maintain the vibrancy of our city in terms of place-making, design and diversity of use.
A design which prioritises motor cars cannot do this. Motor traffic kills the vibrancy of any area. Go to Picardy Place and Leith Street now and, despite their being a building site, you will find yourself lingering in the quiet, car-free atmosphere. This is an opportunity to create an actual place used by people, rather than a gigantic roundabout.
16. Invest £100m in roads and pavements over the next 5 years. This will include road and pavement maintenance, installing more pedestrian crossings, increasing the number of dropped kerbs and dedicate safer foot and cycle paths as well as introducing more pedestrian zones.
There isn’t a pedestrian zone to be seen in the design. Any European city with any ambition (I understand you know Geneva well) would see Picardy Place, with its cathedral, commercial centres and nearby gay quarter as a place to be pedestrianised. Motor traffic could be tolerated on the edges of such a space, but should never be encouraged or dominant. This should be a place for residents, not transient motorists.
17. Guarantee 10% of the transport budget on improving cycling in the city.
The plan as presented has cycle facilities, but they are fragmented and not integrated into a wider network. Money spent on fragments is money wasted. Spend our money on a network and do not allow gaps in it. That’s what will get Edinburgh cycling.
18. Improve Edinburgh’s air quality and reduce carbon emissions. Explore the implementation of low emission zones.
Surely I don’t need to explain how a three-lane gyratory for private cars is not compatible with your own stated aims in this regard?
19. Keep the city moving by reducing congestion, improving public transport to rural west Edinburgh and managing roadworks to avoid unnecessary disruption to the public.
Your own town planners will tell you that construction of any motor facility simply induces journeys by motor car. Removing such facilities causes those same journeys to evaporate. Picardy Place is a chance for you to put down a marker that the car is no longer king in our beautiful city. If you build a three-lane gyratory here you will simply cause congestion there and elsewhere. Reducing congestion means reducing the use of private motor vehicles.
27. Tackle pavement parking and reduce street clutter to improve accessibility
The plan as presented implies the creation of an island hidden behind three lanes of high speed motor traffic. The entire plan is, in my view, clutter. These three lanes will simply fill up with stationary buses and cars and motorists will park their vehicles in the cycle lanes.
My plea to you is this; have some ambition for our city beyond playing catch-up with Glasgow and Birmingham’s programmes of self-harm from the sixties. Picardy Place could become many things, including a garden plaza or a site for locally owned green businesses. It could attract rather than repel people. Think about your favourite places in our city. Do you prefer the West Approach Road or Princes Street Gardens? The bypass or Braid Hill? Queen’s Drive or Queen Street? This could become a new favourite place if we simply have the will to hinder access to motor cars.
When private motor traffic takes over our streets it drives people away and harms business. This is an opportunity to be brave and to make central Edinburgh a great place to live rather than yet another car-infested tourist trap that people flee to the suburbs to escape.
I look forward to hearing from you in due course,
IWRATS
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