Council should ditch soulless pound shop George Street plan - Iain Whyte

Next week the Transport Committee will likely agree a highly controversial ‘reduced design’, cutting down the ‘ambitious’ version and its £35m budget but still costing you a whopping £20m.

The revised revamp plans would do away with new setts and trees but still include planters and benches in the partial pedestrianisation

The cost cutting axes the proposed trees and our historic natural stone setts will be torn up and replaced by cheap asphalt. The grand architectural statement of our 18th century forebears will be converted into a monotonous, tarmac highway.

This entire project is an ideological obsession masquerading as urban improvement. Despite claims that this is a pedestrianisation its core is a giant cycle superhighway.

By prioritising active-travel fundamentalism over pragmatic economic reality, the council will alienate the very people who keep the city centre alive.

Locals with mobility issues, shoppers relying on vehicular access, and businesses requiring seamless deliveries are treated as afterthought inconveniences.

Narrow, anti-business time windows are proposed for delivery vehicles and tourist coaches dropping off at hotels. This will asphyxiate our premium retail and hospitality sectors.

The recent, crippling fire on Princes Street proved that George Street is vital for movement. It was the resilience for our bus-based public transport and this plan removes the city's transport insurance policy.

I suppose that doesn’t matter for ideologically minded councillors who believe our buses should go “to, not through” the city centre - turning around at Haymarket or Picardy Place. For them this plan is the start of banning motor traffic, including buses, from the city centre.

Worse still are the financials. The council plans to use the "tourist tax" to pay for this mess instead of using it for neglected basics like road maintenance, cleaning our filthy streets, fixing the potholes, or repaving Princes Street.

Edinburgh Council is already struggling under a huge debt mountain - the fourth highest of any UK council. But this crazy plan removes all the parking bays with a loss of income of over £3 million a year.

We need to stop borrowing from our children and return to common-sense governance. Keep the income and repair our existing but crumbling public realm.

George Street needs investment, but it needs an eye on commerce, heritage and accessibility, not an asphalt monument to anti-car dogma.

Having dropped the unaffordable vision, the council must drop this pound shop version.