Edinburgh roads: Controversial bus gate to go ahead despite claim it could leave residents with only one road out of West Craigs
‘Everything is being done to accommodate Lothian Buses, but nothing is being done to accommodate the community’ - Norman Rees
A controversial bus gate restricting vehicles exiting Edinburgh’s new West Craigs development has been backed by councillors, despite claims it could leave thousands of residents with only one safe road out of the estate.
The bus gate will stop traffic turning out of Turnhouse Road onto Glasgow Road between 7am and 7pm five days a week.
It is being introduced to ensure there is a bus service for West Craigs. Lothian Buses plans to divert its No 31 bus, which runs between East Craigs and the city centre, into the estate. But it has said without the bus gate it cannot serve West Craigs because the diversion would add too much to journey times.
Norman Rees, of Corstorphine East and West Craigs Community Council, told Edinburgh’s transport committee the council was imposing a bus gate on West Craigs against the wishes of the community and without consultation.
And he said it appeared no lessons had been learned from the previous controversy over a bus gate in Corstorphine, at Manse Road.
Mr Rees said: “From the very start we were informed the ‘views of the local community are an essential part of the process to help inform and develop the proposals’. This is not the case.
“Due to community concerns, we the community council conducted a survey - we polled 972 members of the community and 70 per cent were against the bus gate, and those in favour would prefer it to be peak times only.
“Everything is being done to accommodate Lothian Buses, but nothing is being done to accommodate the community.”
Officials said the bus gate was being introduced as a trial, using an Experimental Traffic Regulation Order, so that changes could be made if necessary.
Lib Dem councillor Kevin Lang claimed the bus gate on Turnhouse Road could mean West Craigs would be left with only one exit.
He said there were currently three ways out of the estate - Turnhouse Road, Craigs Road and Cammo Road.
But he said Cammo Road was a “dangerous rural road” which councillors had previously agreed to close to through traffic and which had seen “another very serious traffic incident” over the summer.
He said many residents agreed it should be closed as a through road. “You should not be able to get in and out via Cammo Road, it is simply too dangerous.”
But he said if the bus gate was installed, removing Turnhouse Road as an exit during the bus gate operating hours, then Cammo Road could not be closed.
“It is simply not possible to have an estate of thousands and thousands of people and only one way out of it.”
He claimed there were other bus priority measures which could be implemented which had been shown to work at other major junctions.
“I am sympathetic with the fact Lothian Buses say they will not put a service in here unless there’s bus prioritisation. I just think there are other, better ways of doing that will mean we are not shutting off road safety projects.”
But transport convener Stephen Jenkinson said Lothian Buses’ position was backed up with data and evidence. “Nobody knows more about running a bus service than Lothian Buses. The decision we have is: Does the estate of West Craigs get serviced by a bus or doesn’t it?”
SNP councillor Neil Gardiner said: “I realise this is a difficult situation for West Craigs with the people who do need to use cars, but we cannot leave a community without a bus service. We cannot leave the elderly, the young and people who don’t drive being isolated in what is almost a town in itself.”
And Tory Jo Mowat said: “People will have bought their properties on the expectation of having public transport, so we need to take this forward.”
The committee voted 8-2 to go ahead with the bus gate.