New fly-through video shows what £800m expansion for Edinburgh BioQuarter would look like

The latest design phase of a planned £800 million expansion of Edinburgh's BioQuarter has been put out for community consultation.

BioQuarter, in the south-east of Edinburgh, is already home to the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and the University of Edinburgh medical school and Centre for Regenerative Medicine and other medical institutes and life sciences businesses.

The latest design plans, shown in a new fly-through video, includes shops, cafes, a gym, hotel, nursery and homes set alongside "state of the art" innovation, teaching and healthcare facilities.

The expansion, which will create Edinburgh’s Health Innovation District, promises to support an additional 9,000 jobs in the city and further construction jobs during the development period.

A visualisation of what the Edinburgh BioQuarter residential area might look like.

Once completed, the expansion should see the BioQuarter support more than 20,000 people with jobs and housing on a 167-acre site.

BioQuarter’s Partners – Edinburgh City Council, NHS Lothian, Scottish Enterprise, and the University of Edinburgh – are updating their existing masterplan to include a wider mix of uses including an increase in residential and commercial properties planned at the site.

The hope is that feedback can help shape how the mixed-use neighbourhood might look over the next decade and beyond.

The consultation on the plan will run online – due to current restrictions caused by Covid-19 – between June 18th and July 13th.

BioQuarter has already benefited from more than £500 million of public capital investment and has a further £300 million of investment planned over the next five years. The scale of the investment has risen by £50 million since February.

The site is also home to innovative research including STOPCOVID, a project aiming to test existing and experimental drugs as treatments for Covid-19, spearheaded by the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Inflammation Research.

Anna Stamp, Edinburgh BioQuarter's interim programme director, said: “We want your views to help shape BioQuarter’s development. This is an exciting time as we look to create a new community in the city; a vibrant neighbourhood that promotes health and wellbeing and compliments its surrounding areas.

"We have a unique opportunity here, which, if developed in the right way, can deliver huge benefits to the city, including economic growth, jobs skills and education. As part of the development of our Health Innovation District, we want to make sure it includes the right mix of amenities that will ensure it becomes a great new place to live, work and discover."

Council leader Adam McVey is also encouraging residents to provide feedback for the "cutting edge development" which he says will make a "massive contribution" to the ongoing regeneration of the south-east of the city.

Details on the plans can be found HERE. Those unable to access the proposals online can request detail on the development by writing to: Edinburgh BioQuarter Programme Team, Community Consultation, NINE, 9 Little France Road, Edinburgh BioQuarter, Edinburgh, EH16 4UX.