Comments on: The grandaddy of car-free developments?

By: Peter Garland

Peter Garland — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 06:30:14 +0000

I think its great to put the underclass in amongst the Porsche/landrover owning wealthy snobs.Kays bar is great if you like rugger, posh speaking advocates and of-duty cops. If you want a nice working class bar in the New town, then probably best to get the train to Glasgow.

By: Peter

Peter — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 09:05:27 +0000

Why criticise the Edinburgh population for not embracing trams? As you say Simon we have an excellent bus based public transport system, which seems to be well used. I just think the locals don't see the need to spend grossly disproportionate sums to replace part of that good system with an inflexible track based system just so the City Fathers can claim that we have a tram system (one route!) like other European cities. Less poluting? Do the calcs on the extra emissions of the construction itself and of the traffic chaos caused by same and the scales tip a bit the other way.

The best comment on the farce that I have yet seen used humour to highlight the nonsense – look for Silence of the Trams on Youtube.

By: Simon

Simon — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 07:47:04 +0000

Interesting indeed , but do you have any evidence that car free was the intention , or was it the most economical use of the plot available?
Edinburgh is a bit of an emigma to me , one of the best bus based public transport systems I have ever seen , cheap,reliable,very frequent,24/7. Yet the worst city traffic I have ever experienced ,and a population that doesn't seem to want to embrace trams or abandone cars either. So since 1982 Edinburgh doesn't seem to have come very far in the car free way of planning, almost the opposite.

By: Paul Tetlaw

Paul Tetlaw — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 21:01:39 +0000

I know it well – it's one of my walking routes through the New Town.
And yes Kay's Bar is well worth a visit.

By: Gerard

Gerard — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 16:27:56 +0000

And when you pop out of the last passage don't just look back, look forward ten yards to Kay's Bar also worth a car free look.

By: Tom Kerswill

Tom Kerswill — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 16:27:52 +0000

That's a great story. I bet the houses towards the middle of the development are lovely and quiet.

Edinburgh's got good public transport too. Plus the Edinburgh CityCar scheme is pretty good – where you pay for a car by the hour, only when you need it. There seem to be a lot of cars located near the city centre — avoiding all those horrible problems of parking etc. and making it a bit more realistic to avoid car ownership.

By: Sheena McCullagh

Sheena McCullagh — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 16:24:33 +0000

I can guess why it doesn't get a mention and the date it was built doesn't surprise me at all, in fact the two are inter-connected. It certainly had to have been built pre 1995 because today it wouldn't get planning permission.

Why not???

No wheelchair access.

No ramps for anyone with reduced mobility.

Which of course also means no easy way to get pushchairs/prams in or out either.

And being completely topical, while it has grates, there is no natural exit for water to flow out (to get out you have to go UP steps at either end).

So let's hope the people who live there never become mobility disabled, nor have children themselves; do not have relatives and friends who want to visit them who are mobility disabled/have young children; and lets hope and pray they are not subjected to torrential ran as has been experienced in Cumbria recently and other parts of the country over the last few years.

In your write-up you say 'maybe there are problems a non-resident wouldn’t know about.' I hope the above gives you some ideas of the potential problems and also explains why it's not well known about.