Edinburgh roads: 'Broken street lights near busy junction posing danger to road users'
Broken street lights near a busy junction on the outskirts of Edinburgh have been posing a danger to road users, a councillor has claimed.
One car crashed into railings on the main A70 Lanark Road West, close to the turning into Bridge Road, Balerno.
And Pentland Hills Tory councillor Graeme Bruce said locals were concerned about the safety risk.
Late today, Scottish Power said they had fixed the problem.
But Cllr Bruce said road-users had been left waiting more than three weeks for the repairs to be carried out.
He said: “We are now into the fourth week with many streetlights failing on Bridge Road and around the corner on Lanark Road West in Balerno. Many residents in Balerno have been in touch with me rightly raising concerns about this serious issue.
“This is a real health and safety risk, especially in this area as there is a high school next to the failing lights which makes it dangerous for any pupils walking to school, and more so after extra school curricular activities, along with those who simply want to walk to and from the village centre.
“We can also see now that a car has gone off the road, mounted a pavement and severely mangled a safety pavement barrier. I'm not aware of anyone being injured but if any pedestrians had been walking past at the time of this incident they could have been severely injured or indeed killed.”
Cllr Bruce said he reported the broken lights to the council on November 16, but believes they had not been working for several days before that.
“The council have reported this failing power supply to Scottish Power Energy Networks (SPEN), but even after repeated attempts by both the council and myself no work started to fix the problem.
“Streetlights are extremely important and especially at this time of year when there is much less daylight. It is really disappointing to see the lack of action from SPEN.”
The council said the failed street lights were due to a fault with the Scottish Power Energy Networks (SPEN) supply. An order had been issued to SPEN for the fault to be repaired on November 18 .
A spokesperson for SP Energy Networks said: “Our teams were made aware of a fault with some of the streetlights in Balerno on 18 November. The broken lights have been repaired by our team today, within the timeframe set out in the Guaranteed Standards for multiple lamp faults. We’re sorry for any inconvenience caused.”