Bridge too far for delivery drivers at Christmas Market - Kevin Buckle

There is a window when deliveries can be made which coincides almost exactly with the time no couriers try to deliver - 10pm to 10am.

Hundreds flocked to the city centre for Edinburgh's Christmas market

Last year there was a meeting with a council official when it became clear that the restrictions were causing huge problems for the shops in the centre and it transpired that while the council had informed the couriers of the restrictions on the Waverley Bridge, they had done nothing to ensure that alternative arrangements were made or, indeed, in most cases even had an acknowledgement.

I’m not optimistic this year as none of the drivers I have spoken to when making deliveries in the last week had received any instructions as to what to do once the bridge is closed.

One of the drivers who normally delivers quite late in the day had remembered what had happened last year and had come up with a plan to deliver early the following morning, but of course none of the shops would be open.

Hopefully we have come up with a plan as I have arranged for him to meet with security and drop all his boxes into my old empty shop so the tenants can then arrange to collect once they are open.

There are, of course, many other delivery drivers and while they have all promised to do what they can to get things to us, given their heavy schedule and the difficulties of driving around the city centre any time of the year it is inevitable that some drivers, especially if just covering the area for a regular driver, will just give up and take the boxes they have back to their base.

Just to rub it in, tenants standing outside waiting to try to collect boxes from the nearest area the couriers are allowed, which is often Market Stree,t will see other vans delivering to the Christmas Market at all times of the day.

The reason given for these vans being allowed to deliver to the Christmas Market during the day was that they had made an appointment and the drivers had security clearance.

Every year the shops in the centre are told they need to make alternative arrangements with the couriers, as if that was remotely possible. For all the obvious reasons, deliveries are made at a time that the couriers dictate, with the only restriction to that being if the sender has paid for a morning delivery.

Every year shops point out to the council that they pay extremely high business rates all year, so don’t expect their business to be disrupted at the most important time of the year for a market that only appears for a couple of months. Such an argument always falls on deaf ears.

The other issue even for those with special permission to deliver and collect which does include the NHS and the post office in the centre is that often the barriers stopping entry on to Waverley Bridge were not manned despite this being a requirement of the restrictions being put in place.

We will wait to see if that situation is repeated again.