SOOT`S New Year Message

Year of The Homecoming 2009 -or should that be Hotel?

Press Release sent earlier today -

Local residents will be on the street outside the Macrae tenements at 221-227 Canongate on The Royal Mile today from 2pm to protest against the council's short sightedness to leave 18 homes empty before they are demolished to make way for a 5 star hotel, at a time when there are nearly half a million bids for 2700 homes this year alone in the capital.


Members of the Canongate Community Forum have asked for an internal investigation into the City of Edinburgh Council
who have refused to answer Freedom of Information requests on how many council houses are empty in the Canongate and what is the loss of revenue.


Today the Canongate Community Forum received this email from a supporter in the West of Scotland

"As a Scot I'm dismayed and disgusted for the proposals in your area which will not only see the destruction of our world heritage status it will continue the fascism of the early eighties that plighted people across Scotland.

It will be a sad loss to the generations of Scots still to be born who would be able to walk these streets and absorb the surroundings enthusing not only learning but also creativity, pride and an understanding of their historic roots.

To remove such buildings and peoples is a socio-cultural crime of such significance that it should be alongside that of the Highland clearances and another indication that we are our own worst enemy as well as a ratification of a move closer to the sterile worlds written within the prophetic novels of Eric Blair and Aldous Huxley.

I wish you well in everything you do in your attempt to overt this national tragedy and hope that these proposals become only a sad reflection of past victories.

I can honestly say I enjoy visiting Edinburgh which evades me due to illness these days and I am deeply saddened by such a proposal which will destroy an area that made me feel so proud to be Scottish and that I hoped to visit again.

Catriona Grant, Chair of the Canongate Community Forum said

"The Homecoming should be about all the people living in Scotland coming home to a home!"

The Year of Homecoming 2009 must insist that homes are built in our city and that existing empty homes are opened up. It should not be used as a justification to build more hotels and more homes becoming holiday lets"

She added - "We will be out today letting the many Hogmanay Visitors see what else is going on in our city"


In September 2006 Scots writer Alasdair Gray said

"Mrs Thatcher called upon the Scots to start exploiting their natural resources, not meaning that they should learn to produce good food, clothes and housing for each other, but earn the money to buy these from tourist industries, thus becoming a nation of boarding houses, heritage trails, golf courses and summer schools, with business conference centres in some of the prettiest places, with nuclear submarine and airforce bases in others. New Labour continues this policy, while drug addiction and brutal crime grow worse in once hopeful housing schemes that are now our new slums. There may be small nations in the world with effective democratic constitutions. Scotland is not among them, perhaps not England either. "

Does the SNP now want to continue this policy, and use the descendents of the last clearances to justify this latest one??

UNESCO inspectors visited the capital in November and "criticised Edinburgh council's handling of the Caltongate development and said the demolition of two listed buildings could have been avoided"

Join us again on New Years Day from 2pm

Quotes on World Heritage Status

Above First Minister Alex Salmond & Minister Linda Fabiani

Who Has Said What -

The First Minister said: “From the Firth of Forth to the Clyde, the Antonine Wall marks the point where the tide turned for the Roman Empire in Scotland. Built by Hadrian’s successor, Emperor Antoninus Pius, it is the furthest frontier and a testament to design and ambition – attributes that echo throughout Scottish history.

“With this wall added to Scotland’s collection of internationally recognised historic sites, Scotland can be hugely proud that so much of our heritage is recognised not only for its impact on our own evolution and identity but for its contribution to the World.

“Next year, with the Scotland’s Year of Homecoming, we have an opportunity to celebrate that contribution. The opening of the Antonine Wall Centre at the Hunterian Museum in 2009 will be a great addition to the cultural experience on offer and I hope that the newly achieved status of our great wall might even inspire returning friends and family to walk the Antonine Way!” Historic Scotland


Commenting on World Heritage Day in 2008, Linda Fabiani the Scottish Minister for Europe, External Affairs and Culture stated: "We can... take the opportunity to reflect upon the contribution of our own World Heritage sites and their place in the global story of humanity. We can celebrate, with justified pride, Scotland's contribution".[2] More Here

The leader of the City of Edinburgh Council Jenny Dawe said: “Edinburgh has a rich architectural heritage and is proud of its city centre UNESCO World Heritage Site status. We do not want to see that status compromised”.

She went on to quote Renzo Piano, the Italian architect who designed the Pompidou Centre in Paris. Talking about designing new architecture in historic environments he said:
“When you work in a historical city centre, instead of worrying about the lack of freedom you should be grateful for the restrictions. Creativity doesn’t need freedom, it needs rules.”

World Heritage Day 2008

Why invest in Edinburgh?

Reputation

Edinburgh is Scotland's capital city,
home of the Scottish Parliament
and the consulate core.
Edinburgh is the world's festival city,
a World Heritage Site,
the world's first UNESCO City of Literature,
a leading international financial centre,
a recognised 'Ideopolis' of knowledge
and is renowned worldwide for innovation and cultural excellence
Inspiring Capital.com

Edinburgh is being Vandalised

Nothing Less Than Vandalism

Above is one possible emblem for Edinburgh, replacing the UNESCO

World Heritage Emblem which the city looks set to lose....

Joanna Blythman on built heritage in today`s The Sunday Herald

Thanks to the unique blend of medieval and neo-classical architecture in its old and new towns, Edinburgh holds a coveted international listing as a Unesco World Heritage Site, an accolade only awarded to places of exceptional architectural and historical merit.

Read here why

This is a huge honour, so you might think that all the councillors and officials who passed through the portals of the city chambers would be circumspect enough to realise that even if the finer points of architecture were beyond them, you don't imperil such a listing. No such luck. Koichiro Matsuura, the director-general of this UN cultural body, has had to warn Edinburgh that if it proceeds with certain new developments (of which more below), its world heritage status may be threatened. He has requested that the city puts these plans on hold, pending Unesco's investigation, or risk having its Unesco status stripped from it.

Man from UNESCO, he say no


The alarm has been sounded, but smug Edinburgh Council shows no signs of taking heed. In the past it would have. For decades, conservatism and preservation of the status quo were the order of the day. Thanks to the vigilance of groups such as the Cockburn Association, most of the lunatic plans advanced for the city were thwarted, with the prominent exception of the St James Centre. Not bad going when you think that Glasgow got saddled with a motorway that savaged its Victorian grid.


Unfortunately in recent years Edinburgh has been plagued by councillors who, though their politics differ, have one thing in common - their egos are bigger than their brains and their judgement is wanting. Puffed up and romanced by developers and modernist architects who feed them the pretentious, self-aggrandising vocabulary of "iconic buildings", "signature architecture", "architectural statements" and "iconoclastic, brave development" - like teenage vandals carving their initials on the ancient stones of the Acropolis - they yearn to leave their hubristic mark on the city for posterity. Hence the spate of fatally misconceived plans that are being given the go-ahead, even though they perpetuate old mistakes and grind their killer heels in the face of Edinburgh's handsome heritage.


How on Earth was the capital's number one vandal, Edinburgh University, allowed to squeeze yet another architecturally meritless, oversized concrete block into Bristo Square? With its track record of flattening three sides of Georgian George Square and erecting the monstrous David Hume Tower, it should have been placed on a Gary Glitter-style register of recidivist architectural offenders never to be trusted.


Just next to abused George Square, the city's Quartermile development is partially completed. A riot of U-PVC and tinted glass that spurns more vernacular, sustainable materials like wood and stone, its overpriced, aspirational yuppie condominiums add only to our housing stock of exclusive, soulless, ever-so-slightly sinister compounds for the very rich.


Then there's the scandal of Caltongate, where two listed buildings on the historic Royal Mile are to be demolished to make way for a five-star hotel and conference centre - as if Edinburgh needs another. But the most monstrously inappropriate scheme yet given approval is the 17-storey (yes, that's right, 17-storey!) hotel and office development at Haymarket. This has been sold by its promoters as "a gateway of blade-like sharpness in the form of a tower" that will "act as a beacon at night" and function as "a gateway building marking the entry into the World Heritage Site from the west". What preposterous and fanciful nonsense.


I happen to agree, on the whole, with Leon Krier, guru of the New Urbanism school of architecture, who said that "the most beautiful and pleasant cities which survive in the world today have all been conceived with buildings of between two and five floors". Even those who go for all that "street in the sky" rhetoric spouted by ideologues of modernism ought to admit that Edinburgh is not Manhattan. However bored architects may be with working in the confines of a conservation-minded city, a philistine should see that 17 storeys are brazenly out of scale among Edinburgh's traditionally low-rise buildings.

It's hard to see Haymarket's proposed tower (above) as anything other than a grotesquely super-sized, overbearing monument to architectural arrogance and civic stupidity. Worse, I interpret it as a declaration that it is now open season on Edinburgh's outstanding urban heritage, one that ratifies the Caltongate precedent.


Former Lord Provost Lesley Hinds betrayed a rare flash of self-doubt after the Haymarket decision when she remarked that "we will be damned or we might be congratulated in the future".



I'll place my bet now. The Haymarket tower will be viewed as Edinburgh's biggest post-St James Centre planning gaffe and those who voted for it as dangerous idiots.

St James Centre

It's not just the odd bad building here and there. The plans for Edinburgh become ever more scarring and radical. Part of me wants to see the miscreants punished by losing Unesco status, but then Edinburgh suffers along with them.

Sean Connery who visited the capital last week, perhaps warning the first minister of the danger the city faces

Time for the grown-ups to step in. Alex Salmond must hold an inquiry into both the Caltongate and Haymarket follies before the council fouls up the city's heritage for posterity.

More on the vandalism of Edinburgh

Demand continues to Call-IN Caltongate

Latest News is that yes, the plans have been rubber stamped this afternoon!

Hear the city`s design champion Sir Terry Farrel speak of the problems facing Edinburgh on the BBC Radio Good Morning Scotland programme from earlier today Listen at 2 hrs 22 mins

STV will be covering it on thier local news programme Scotland Today at 6pm

BBC coverage

Groundhog Day at City Chambers

This afternoon the Caltongate Applications go to committee once again, six months late due to yet another council error!! It has been recommended again they be rubber stamped then referred to ministers once more. With the increased awareness of the potential damage to the capital from Caltongate and other proposed developments, the ministers will surely see reason and Call the Plans in. Otherwise its bye bye Athens of the North. See yesterdays post on repeated call-in request by Msps.

This excellent letter from Jim Johnson an architect for close on 50 years, and former Director of the Edinburgh Old Town Renewal Trust sums up why the plans should be called- in-

Alex Salmond MSP
First Minister
The Scottish Parliament
Holyrood
Edinburgh 20 August 2008


Dear Minister,

Caltongate Planning Applications: 07/01287/FUL, 07/04400/FUL, 07/01237/FUL, 07/01288/FUL, and 07/01241/FUL.

I received a letter from the City of Edinburgh dated 6 August giving the opportunity to objectors to make further representations about this application. A number of mistakes have been made by the planning department during the consultation and processing of these applications. Circumstances have changed since the Council made its decision. The importance of the site, the complexity of the issues and the conflict of interests between the Council as a partner in the development and as the planning authority, clearly shows the need for an independent, impartial review of the whole masterplan process and the subsequent determination of the planning applications.

I request that the applications be called-in by the Scottish Ministers for the following reasons:

1. The international concern over the potential damage to the Edinburgh World Heritage site has been demonstrated (subsequent to the determination of the applications by the City Council) by the decision of UNESCO to send a delegation to examine the position in Edinburgh. UNESCO has expressed concern that the Council may have acted wrongly in approving the development without referring to UNESCO before taking a decision. The threat to the City’s World Heritage status was highlighted by many who opposed the masterplan and the detailed planning applications, but their view was steadfastly rejected and rubbished by the Council. The objectors have been proved right.

2. The Council’s justification for the departure from the statutory Structure Plan and national planning policies is that the development will achieve economic and employment benefits. But the benefits listed are purely speculative and remain untested by any impartial expert assessment. Most of the benefits are based on highly contentious information provided by the developer and consultants employed by him. There is no evidence that they have been tested or analysed in any detail by the planning authority. Given the downturn in the economy since the original applications were lodged, the claimed benefits have become even more questionable and need to be re-examined.

3. The developer has demonstrated no commitment to a genuine consultation process. He has repeatedly stated that the scheme (particularly the hotel, its most contentious and damaging element) is an “all or nothing” development, and refused to consider a phased approach to this very large site. In addition, the setting up of a “consultation group” (invited and administered by the developer) only sought to manipulate the consultation process to the developer’s advantage and avoid the implementation of the National Standards for Community Engagement. The City Council has acquiesced to this sham.

4. The government’s commitment to a more sustainable future for Scotland (eg. by cutting carbon emissions) and the City’s aspirations to become an exemplar for sustainable city life, are both undermined by the Caltongate proposals. As presented the scheme is very far from an example of sustainable “best practice” despite the claims in the developer’s Sustainability Appraisal, which is no more than a “green wash” over the design (I submitted a detailed critique of this appraisal to the Council dated 7 May 2006). I can only conclude that the planning department lack the resources (or time) to analyse the veracity of the submitted proposals.

5. The Council claims the Caltongate development is “is of outstanding design quality” I would dispute this. I have been in practice as an architect for close on 50 years, latterly as Director of the Edinburgh Old Town Renewal Trust. I am not a “preservationist” - I believe that new developments in historic cities should be in a contemporary style, reflecting modern requirements and materials. But this proposal falls well short of the standard that should be aimed for in Edinburgh. I have rarely seen a more banal overall design, and am at a loss how the City can consider that “the quality of the urban design solution will enhance the Conservation area, the Edinburgh World Heritage site and the setting of listed buildings” – particularly as the developer intends to demolish the listed buildings!

Yours faithfully,

Jim Johnson
Dip. Arch. ARIAS

This excellent letter is in today`s Scotsman 27 Aug 08

Stand firm against those who would sacrifice capital's heritage status

I am disappointed by reactions to Unesco's comments about proposed developments within the designated world heritage site in Edinburgh (Focus, 26 August). I would have expected some fervour, yet have heard none.


We are talking about a world heritage site – not a Lothian heritage site nor even a British one – of such importance within the built and natural heritage of this planet that it has been picked out for an accolade and recognition as being among the finest things in the world. Yet to hear current debate it would appear little more than a nuisance.

I can imagine the clamour were other world heritage sites to come under such ill-considered attack. The Macchu Pichu Hilton? Go-karting amongst the chicanes of Stonehenge? BMX parks over the pyramids?

Yet here we are happy to see a prime site let to commercial developers in a way that would be hardly acceptable in a minor provincial town. This, too, with defence from the city fathers and the Chamber of Commerce. Members of the chamber, I would suggest, do not all work in offices, but are interested to see the premium visitors and companies attracted here because Edinburgh is still well worth visiting and living in. What Chamber has to say 25 Aug 08


Edinburgh is a lived-in and living city, and must never be frozen in time. It must, however, recognise that it is, like Prague and Florence, greater than the sum of its parts. To begin to erode and then to replace with dull, pedestrian – but no doubt commercially viable – buildings is not only cruel, it is shortsighted and shows a total misunderstanding of this place.

We should be proud of this city; it is unique. While current attitudes to Unesco's observations prevail, we can hardly complain about the tatty tourist shops, unweeded pavements and traffic chaos. These could be settled at a stroke. Beginning the destruction of a world heritage site in the name of commerce is no less than authorised vandalism and I am astonished that we are not out in our thousands marching to save our beautiful city from yet more misguided and substandard "developments".

There always is a stronger commercial argument, but many cities have recognised that this can be short-term gain for a very long-term loss, and have master-planned to save the blight.

Edinburgh more than justifies its Unesco recognition, and to many of us this matters. We are tenants of this city, not owner-occupiers; let's try not to mess it up too much for future generations.

DAVID GERRARD Spylaw Park Edinburgh


The pro-active role of the Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce in promoting the development Caltongate Developer Manish Chande is head of the Chamber`s property portfolio group and in the past in The Evening News Ron Hewitt of Chambers Roots For Caltongate

But as we all can see from this Article Ron Hewitt likes writing fiction --

"It sounds bizarre, but Ron Hewitt, who took over the reins at the chamber earlier this year, writes novels about a murderer of paedophiles in his spare time."

Edinburgh Under Investigation

Unesco to investigate if Edinburgh should lose world heritage status

Read Caltongate Calamity piece by Conservation architect James Simpson which gives the overall damage that Edinburgh faces if Caltongate was to go ahead.


Published Date: 07 July 2008 By BRIAN FERGUSON The Scotsman

Article in Evening News and BBC TV Coverage STV News

AN INVESTIGATION has been ordered into Edinburgh's World Heritage Status, The Scotsman has learned.

An official inquiry, which may lead to the capital being stripped of the title by Unesco, was launched yesterday at a summit of the world heritage committee in the Canadian city of Quebec.

Delegates said they were particularly concerned about the potential impact and handling by the Scottish Government of Caltongate, a massive new development in Edinburgh's Old Town, which was approved despite around 1,800 objections being received.

The Scottish Government, which approved the scheme last month after dismissing demands for a public inquiry, has been condemned for failing to consult Unesco before coming to a final decision on the scheme, which will see two listed buildings demolished to make way for a five-star hotel.

The inquiry will also examine the proposed redevelopment of Leith's docklands over the next 20 years and the planned revamp of the St James Centre.

A team of Unesco inspectors will visit Edinburgh later this year to assess its "state of conservation".

The Scottish Government has been ordered to submit its own dossier by February of next year. The 2009 Unesco summit in Seville will then decide if there is enough evidence for Edinburgh to be placed on the "at risk" register.

A spokesman for Unesco's world heritage committee said: "The committee voiced concern at the potential impact of the Caltongate development and were also deeply concerned that it was approved by the state government in June without complying with the operational guidelines for world heritage sites.

"The Scotsman understands that Unesco officials are adamant Caltongate fell under the category of "major restorations or new constructions which may affect the outstanding universal value of the property".

According to its guidelines, Unesco should be consulted before any such development is ruled on.

The opening of the inquiry into Edinburgh's world heritage status, which Unesco awarded to the Old and New Towns in 1995, will be a major concern for the city council and the Scottish Government.

Councillors have come under mounting pressure from their own officials and business leaders in the capital not to turn down major developments amid claims Edinburgh is losing out on investment to Manchester and Glasgow. However, heritage and conservation groups have repeatedly warned that Edinburgh's heritage status is being put at risk by over-development of sensitive sites.

About 2,000 jobs have been promised by Mountgrange, the developer of the £300 million Caltongate scheme, which involves the creation of a hotel and conference centre, 200 homes, a public square, office blocks and a new arts quarter.

Councillors approved the vast majority of the Caltongate scheme at the first time of asking. The same happened last month when a 17-storey hotel at Haymarket was approved despite claims it would ruin views from as far afield as the Dean Gallery and Inverleith Park.

Liverpool is already being investigated by Unesco amid concern over the scale of development at its waterfront, while a separate inquiry is under way into the impact of new skyscrapers near the Tower of London.

Historic Scotland endorsed the Caltongate development, but has been fiercely critical of the proposals for Leith Docks and the St James Centre.

Historic Scotland declined to comment yesterday, but culture minister Linda Fabiani, who is responsible for the agency, said: "I'm confident that when the Unesco mission visits our capital, it will see a vibrant, growing city which embraces its cultural and architectural heritage as well as managing an improvement in development that benefits Edinburgh as a whole.

"Steve Cardownie, Edinburgh's deputy council leader, said: "I don't think we'd be too perturbed over this. It's fairly commonplace for Unesco to re-evaluate World Heritage Sites and that kind of scrutiny goes along with the title. I don't think Edinburgh has done anything to devalue its status."The St Kilda archipelago, New Lanark and Orkney's "Neolithic Heart" are among Scotland's other world heritage sites.

Manish Chande of London Developers Mountgrange who are behind Caltongate. Will this image of him pulling a "Braveheart" bull come back to chase him out of the city as fast as he dragged it in.

See what will be lost here www.eh8.org.uk

Margo Questions Alex

Go to 18mins 58secs First Ministers Questions on Thursday 19th June 2008 to hear Independent Msp Margo Macdonald question the First Minister Alex Salmond on the Government`s decision this week not to call in the Caltongate Planning Applications, his answer was brief and he said the City Council are best placed to consider developments for the city....are they really, considering they entered into a questionable land deal ?

This is currently under investigation by the EU

Remember this? Developers Funded Labour from 21st Feb 2008 in The Times from the article

"Links between the Labour Party and the developer of the controversial Caltongate project in Edinburgh have come under renewed scrutiny following the disclosure that the company, Mountgrange, made a £4,000 donation for a champagne reception at a Scottish Labour Party fund-raising dinner."

Now if it had to go to ministers because of the financial interest why oh why did the First Minister brush it aside so quickly when questioned by Margo Macdonald? Saying the council were best placed, its obvious they are not, and the only thing that matters to them is the money promised....this tawdry development the means they believe the only way to get it.

And remember this?

"The scheme will have to go before the Scottish parliament in any event, as the city council has a stake in the scheme. Mountgrange bought some council-owned land around the site it owned, a former bus garage, which was due to be developed. The council will receive a small share of the profits from the site. ‘It was done to make sure the council didn’t sell us short,’ says Berry. ‘It only has a passive involvement.’ "

"In October, eyebrows were also raised over the appointment of Donald Anderson, former council leader, as Scottish director of PPS, the public relations agency that is promoting Caltongate on behalf of Mountgrange."

This appeared in Property Week on the 14th March Full Article Here

Really does the whole thing not stink as much as an American Tycoon`s Toupee??

And let us not forget that developer Manish Chande is friends with Malcolm Cooper of Historic Scotland, that Manish Chande is the Property Portfolio boss in Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce.

"Ron Hewitt, chief executive of Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, said: "Meeting Malcolm and hearing his views has been a breath of fresh air.

and Caltongate Architect Malcolm Fraser even sings the praises of Malcolm Cooper "Malcolm is great because he puts himself around, he comes and sees people and he is interested in listening as well as talking."Historic Scotland has changed. The understanding of the value of heritage is evolving, and I welcome their readiness to enjoy good modern work." says Malcolm Fraser who is the architect of the controversial building for Jeffrey St, see below.

Full piece here Historic Scotland and Caltongate

My worries over Caltongate grow By MARGO MacDONALD

THE 2000 objections to the Caltongate development came from town planners, architects, people who live in the Old Town, elsewhere in the city and outside the Capital: a disparate group possibly only united in their pride in, and concern for, Edinburgh.

Full article here Evening News 20th Feb 2008