CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 15years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
I discovered Madame IWARTS
Pith helmet firmly on head, you presumably then named her after your favourite minor royal and made off with her natural resources while assuring her you would allow her to manage her own affairs when you judged her to have become sufficiently civilised?
@unhurt
We came to an arrangement whereby the locals we haven't worked to death are held in a human zoo.
Just went through the hellscape and London Road roundabout and it was... fine? Either the bus gate is working or everyone has just disappeared.
“
10 Grass on the roundabout at Picardy Place has long gone to be replaced by concrete for lots of concrete.
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Took taxi from work to a restaurant event in Forth St. went round the houses. Would have been quicker walking
North Bridge nose-to-tail buses in one lane and general traffic in another. The main cause seemed to be two vans parked at the end of the greenway, which blocked the buses from getting through to use the green arrow to Princes Street. Both ticketed but no sign of owner. Can they tow transit vans?
@jonty
Good they got ticketed! Spa Supplies and a generic white van if I remember correctly. Incredibly selfish.
@jonty @iwrats
Towing is the only deterrent.
I had a joiner doing some work recently. He said that he just parks where he wants and if he gets a ticket he appeals it by saying he was “loading” - pretty high success rate apparently. The unsuccessful ones get passed on to customers in some form.
@Stickman
I have a scheme whereby on the third offence the vehicle is confiscated and crushed and the driver loses their licence for a year.
I had my windows done by someone who was lamenting that he used to know the warden in my area and not get tickets off him, but that he's retired now.
To be honest I'm not that fussed with half the illegal parking that goes on for trades (except in respect of fairness for people who do it 'properly') - folk need deliveries and to get stuff done and that tends to require a van parked nearby, which is often done considerately if not legally.
The trouble is that the other half of completely antisocial and inconsiderate parking which is punished in exactly the same lenient way. Is the way decriminalised enforcement works the problem here? The owner of those vans probably wouldn't have left them there if they could expect spiraling fines, impounded vehicles and a visit from the police.
Unfortunately, there's no legal differentiation between delaying literally thousands of people by parking double yellows at the end of a bus lane and overstaying on George Street for ten minutes. And, bizarrely, it's probably easier to get out the first offence than the second as Stickman says. This gradually leads to the situation we have now where folk will even double park outside empty spaces because they can't be bothered pulling in for a ten minute stop.
I need to use motorised transport tomorrow, and most routes between me and destination go through Picardy Place or New Town.
Are the busses moving ok? I'll likely get a taxi back home, and would like to be prepared to suggest an alternate route if necessary. I'm not paying to be sat in traffic.
The North Bridge/Waterloo Place/Leith St junction gums up really easily even when restricted as it only takes a couple of buses to block everything. London Road gets the knock-on delay from that junction and Montgomery Street was backed-up almost to the park with traffic waiting to get to Annandale Street do the diversion. I'd go up Easter Road and Abbeyhill, or Lochend Road and Abbey Lane.
I'm coming from Canonmills and heading west, so looks like the problem areas shouldn't affect my route.
I hate not being able to cycle somewhere, so much more complicated.
Tailbacks onto London Road and Leith Walk yesterday mid-morning (10.30am approx.). Nightmarish pollution drenched congested streets. I was glad of the (officially closed) segregated bike lane as I made my way up to Leith Street...
If I have the luxury of time, sometimes it's actually preferable to go via Abbeyhill to Holyrood and up the Royal Mile instead. Ridiculous detour really, but less of a diesel particulate inhaling near-crushing experience.
the canuck - any way you could jump on a hire bike, even for part of the trip? I've found them useful for one-way trips, or killing part of a long walk. Might be handy even just to get you past the city centre, so you can grab a bus that should make reasonable progress.
My taxi the other night when I would have been quicker walking went down Calton road, up to Abbeyhill up Regents Road and down Annandale st then back up to Broughton St
Cycled from Leith towards the city centre today in the morning, in primary position at the section where there's only one lane. As soon as there were 2 lanes again I received a close pass and the driver shouted at me for not using the officially still closed cycle lane. Joy.
Drivers have got used to that wide bit now in both directions so start edging from side to side as if to try and overtake the wide motor vehicle in front of them as they approach. It also means filtering up the side is near-impossible as they take it in turns to abut the kerb and cones to left and right.
I've been doing this thing year round for decades now but Leith Street to Princes Street last night unnerved me. It's genuinely horrible, real dog-eat-dog stuff.
Judging by the tailbacks at top of Easter Road/Abbeymount this morning, I would advise cyclists to avoid that route also. Too many "frustrated" motorists around the place: just not worth it.
Montrose Terrace/Regent Road on the other hand, relatively peaceful. So there's an option for heading into the centre.
They’ve been creating the cycle lane on the smaller island recently and oddly it seems it’ll be at grade and delineated purely by size of stone paving.
(pavement left, cycle lane central)
I’m still bemused as to why one side of the junction will have brick paving at crossings but the other won’t. Maybe it’s some grand place making that I couldn’t possibly understand.
A landscape gardener was on site today and I can't even
Could not turn left to get along queen street to night. Guy on building site said i could not get through as it was a building site. Had to divert by the back streets en route to blackhall by jingo
They've got to spend the sixty million quids loan somehow, so why not go for luxury paving on the Traffic Island Of Lost Souls? After all we're the suckers who are paying for it ultimately.
I was given to understand that the Golden Turd is disbursing?
In theory, the sixty mil will be clawed back by the council via enhanced business rates from retailers etc. in the new St James centre. That's how GAM is supposed to work. If that happens it will take twenty-odd years for the loan to be repaid. What happens if the business rates are not as enhanced as the projections? Or the number of tenants in the new complex reduced? The council bears all the risk. So we the council tax payers are ultimately hit with the bill.
They told me they were coughing up for the work on the condition it's left alone for ten years after the Turd opens.
If that's the case what is the GAM deal loan of sixty million smackers paying for?
According to the Scottish Futures Trust:
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The GA investment supports public sector enabling investments: -
- public-realm improvements;
- major highway improvements and traffic management proposals; and
- a new energy centre, as well as replacing and upgrading essential utility services.
---
Further on, it goes on to say:
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SG agreed to provide revenue grant funding to CEC in relation to the enabling investments. Release of the revenue grant over 25 years is based upon a number of broad areas, and achieving these, reflecting the anticipated growth: -
- Increases in rateable value within the development;
- Increases in rateable value in the wider Edinburgh economy beyond historic performance;
and
- Job and training outcomes within identified areas of deprivation in Edinburgh, identified through the Scottish Government’s Index of Multiple Deprivation.
---
While it talks about a grant, I had understood CEC had taken out a loan to pay for the work, which is being delivered by St James contractors, probably for an agreed price. Presume the grant pays off the loan over 25 years, but only if ams are achieved? If not achieved, revenue grant is withheld?
https://www.scottishfuturestrust.org.uk/storage/uploads/Growth_Accelerator_-_Guidance.pdf
Do you like ugly building sites?
Sad that Picardy Place will be finished soon?
GOOD NEWS!
The central island is going to be used as a storage compound for tram works meaning it won’t actually be finished until late 2022.
Oh, the York Place cycleway? That won’t be finished until early 2021 now.
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