Traffic Issues in Inverleith

by Pippa Leary
(reprinted from The Inverleith News, Summer 2003)

Things have moved on since last year. As many of you may remember a consultation exercise was carried out by the City last summer. For our area this meant leaflets delivered to most residents at home and, additionally, the traffic consultant staffed exhibitions in Stockbridge Primary School and McDonald Road Library. Despite being held in the holiday season the exhibitions were busy with numerous questions asked indicating that this was an element of city living that mattered to residents.

Based on the response to this consultation, the City formulated a proposal for an extended Central Parking Zone (CPZ). The features of this proposal include such familiar items as:

• Hours - 8:30-5:30
• Days - Monday to Friday
• Likely cost - £80 pa.

And new features such as:

• Three types of parking bay; residents only, public pay and display and a new feature, a shared bay open to either residents or paying drivers;
• A limit on the number of permits to only one per household;
• Guest permits - likely to be limited to 50 half day permits whose cost is based on 2/3 of the cost of four hours parking which are available to all residents whether they buy a parking permit or not.

So what's your response to this? Mine was mixed. I am glad to see progress and feel the shared bay concept whereby, as I understand it, a permit-bearing resident's car can be left round the clock, is a creative measure.

What I regret is that the local character seems to have got lost in the proposal. What do I mean by local character? I am referring to the amount of open space in Inverleith supplemented by what planners call the dispersed land use pattern. In parking terms that means the space made available by the number of streets developed on only one side (around the Botanics, Inverleith Park and Warriston Playing Field) and detached houses. This dispersed land use pattern means that Inverleith can accommodate the cars residents are likely to generate - provided residents continue to accept a walk to the car is likely. So why the rigid limitation of only one permit per household? The one permit per household limit doesn't seem to me to reflect the complexity of modern life; particularly the employment picture, where it is not unusual for there to be two or more working people in one household. It also doesn't seem like fair treatment: no limit is imposed in the existing CPZ though that, I understand, is under review.

Given this draconian limit on permits I am increasingly disappointed that the Council did not see fit to implement the part-day solution advocated by the Inverleith Society in the Inverleith area. This is regulation with a lighter touch and has been instituted in other cities, e.g. areas within London, Oxford and Winchester.

So how do we feel when we learn that the Council has decided to implement the part day solution in Moredun around the new Royal Infirmary? Flattered or miffed?

The Council's action seems to indicate it believes the system can work but not in our area. Why not? One of its major benefits is that it is less expensive to enforce; this is reflected in the much lower charge Moredun residents pay, half of what other areas pay. That doesn't seem fair to us and certainly not for our neighbours living near the Western General where surely the same conditions apply?

Fairness seems essential. Residents and Council Tax payers would hope that their need to run a car or cars and for space to park would be considered a higher priority than providing parking spaces for commuters.

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