On 16 August, local stakeholders met Council-appointed agents to discuss the future design of the Picardy Place island. In Issue 321, we published a measured account of those proceedings by Peter Williamson, who attended as Chair of the Picardy Place Residents Association.
Others present were a landscape architect from Atkins, project management consultants Turner & Townsend, a Council official, Councillors Miller and Mowat (Ward 11), and representatives from the Cockburn Association, Living Streets, New Town & Broughton Community Council, the Playhouse, and Spokes.
Spurtle understands few were satisfied with the context, content or likely outcome of the meeting.
It should have occurred far earlier over the last three years, with opportunities for orderly follow-up meetings as a design evolved. Instead, what locals got was an ‘inadequate and truncated’ one-off event organised at short notice.
Blaming Covid for the absence of a proper process convinced nobody.
Little to discuss
It became apparent at the meeting that, with construction due to begin in 2023, many aspects of the c. £2.5 m design were already established and not open to further discussion or amendment.
With no accurate detail available on probable pedestrian flows through and around the area, attendees were unable to contribute meaningfully on its potential use; for example, which parts should be paved.
With no accurate detail on sub-soil conditions and infrastructure, attendees could not even suggest what shrubbery and trees should go where. Hence, it was suggested that gravel be used as a temporary fix until better informed (and consulted) decisions become possible later.
Atkins and Turner & Townsend have undertaken to ‘think about’ stakeholders’ contributions before taking whatever proposals they finalise to be rubber-stamped at Committee level.
Not good enough
When Edinburgh Council’s Head of Placemaking and Mobility, Daisy Narayanan, spoke at the NTBCC meeting on 8 August, she acknowledged and understood widespread frustration at these shortcomings.
But she could offer only vague undertakings about leaving the central island as ‘more than just a roundabout’, a pleasant and safe space reflecting ‘some aspirations of locals’.
The fault is not hers – she has come late to this fiasco. In truth, the failure of elected representatives and officials to engage effectively with locals on this matter was apparent from the start and has its origins in decisions taken as long ago as 2009.
To interested observers, it has always felt as if decisions were being made at a higher level, according to the dictates of a car-focused Transport mindset, Trams to Newhaven constructors, and the opaque GAM deal between Edinburgh Council and St James Quarter developers.
Voters and residents have been excluded. This is not worthy of Edinburgh. This is not how such important projects should be handled in a democracy.
Got a view? Tell us at
spurtle@hotmail.co.uk and @theSpurtle
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