East Craigs traffic scheme: Is Edinburgh Council set to back down? – Steve Cardownie

Tomorrow’s Transport and Environment Committee will attempt to put the contentious issue of the traffic initiatives envisaged for East Craigs to bed by voting for a compromise solution.

Lesley Macinnes addresses an open-air meeting attended by up to 1,000 people about the council's plans for East Craigs (Picture: Alex Cole-Hamilton)

The council has faced stern opposition from local residents who sought legal advice to back up their case that the measures were intrusive and should not be introduced as emergency schemes to help deal with social distancing issues related to Covid-19.

The council went running for its own legal advice which I anticipated a couple of weeks ago when I wrote “I would hazard a guess that the advice admits that East Craigs residents may have a case and one that the council may have difficulty successfully challenging”.

The advice given to the council has not been made public but the report to be presented to committee states that there are legal risks in going ahead with the original scheme and invites the committee to pursue a different course of action.

The original report endorsed by the committee stated that any new traffic proposals “will be undertaken in collaboration (my emphasis) with the city’s citizens and businesses” but if this is an example of working in collaboration with the city’s citizens, it leaves a lot to be desired.

Many aspects of the new traffic measures are to be welcomed but if there is genuine, sound opposition to some of them by local people then the council should listen.

It is unedifying for the council to be seen to be scurrying off for legal advice to combat residents’ opposition and it does nothing to convince people that “collaboration” is council policy.

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