Flowers for the gap sites

Edinburgh Council wants to grass and plant flowers in the gap sites of Edinburgh hopefully in their attempt to win Britain in Bloom. Read more here. This is not a bad idea but it should not be the only idea for gap sites. The Caltongate site has a £100,000 bond for a land art scheme if work did not go ahead within 3 months of planning permission - more than a year later and Mountgrange in administration where is the land art scheme, where is the £100,000??? The Republic says "show us the money" - the contract states that the money was to be held in a joint bank account with the council and Mountgrange. The community should have a say how this bond should be managed and spent.

Contact your local councillor and ask about the bond and when will it be released. Citizens in the Republic think much more is needed than grass and some cornflowers, if it is to be a public space even temporarily then it needs to be thought about, whatever happens, a continued gap site would be an eyesore and a testimony to mismanagement .

£150 million to build 1300 council homes

Doozers doing their thing

At long last - after a generation of not building homes the council is to build and manage council homes, please can the houses be family sized homes, three and four bedroom (even bigger for some families) as they are much needed. Read more here

Council - please note that in the republic, that there is land in the Old Town crying out for housing and with planning permission too and belongs to the council e.g. Calton Road (and more but you could start here).

Hopefully the council will work with communities to build homes they need with the infrastructure required so mistakes of the 60s and 70s are not replicated.

Bath and Edinburgh At Risk

The issue of whether Bath should be stripped of its coveted World Heritage status because of the controversial Western Riverside development is to be scrutinised by conservation experts from across the globe.

The United Nations' World Heritage Committee will meet in Quebec, Canada, in July ? and the question of Bath's status is high on the agenda. The committee will decide whether Bath should be formally placed on its World Heritage 'in danger' list because of the Western Riverside scheme.
The 43-acre development along the Avon will feature residential housing blocks, which objectors say will spoil the city's skyline. World Heritage Status brings huge kudos to the cities and locations which hold it.
To lose it would be a sharp blow to Bath's reputation as a world-leading tourism destination. Full Article Here
See more here on Bath

Edinburgh is also at risk of losing her World Heritage Status because of the proposed Caltongate scheme.

"ICOMOS-UK considers that the Caltongate project should have been referred to the UNESCO World Heritage Centre.

Furthermore we consider that it would be appropriate for the UNESCO World Heritage Committee to consider these proposals. However, as quoted above, such notification should take place before any approval is given.

If the proposals are referred to the World Heritage Centre, then they might be considered by the World Heritage Committee at its next session in Quebec in July 2008. The Committee would then have the option to ask for a joint UNESCO WH Centre/ICOMOS Mission to consider the project and the Mission’s report would be presented to the Committee. If they were concerned, the Committee could press for changes to be made to the project or they have the option to consider putting the site on the List of World Heritage in Danger until such time as the threats could be removed." February 2008 6th this is taken from ICOMOS On Caltongate

What You Can Do To Help

Dracula Speaks

This has to be read in the style of Dracula(for it to work....(sorry we have had a long and emotional day, you will have to indulge us).

"Today I feasted on the people of Edinburgh ha ha ha ha ha........I have sucked the blood from the community, from the council housing, the heritage.......ha ha ha ha Van Hesling could not fight me, for with my £300 million I am safe to demolish any building I want......I can have what I want........I don't have to show my bank balance.... the councillors fell for my evil but simple plan....ha ha ha ha

As a Tory it was easy.......I brought my friend Igor, you will know him in his disguise of Malcolm Cooper with me from Englandshire... he told me - "Lord of Darkness do not worry I will get through your application , with my job in Scottish Heritage, I will just tell these fools there is economic justification, they are greedy they will fall for it" And that is was my little friend ,Igor did.... ha ha ha.... my other Tory friends Joanna Mowatt and Cameron Rose they fought so gallantly for me, my heart (if I had one) beated with pride"

The fools, the Planning Committee fell under my spell, they did not consider the whinges from the community or these know-it-all heritage groups as my money spoke...... threee hundred millliiiiooonnnnn pounds can buy you what you like ha ha ha ha ha ha.

My friends from the night, from the Planning Department bored them sooooo much they could not tell they were being sold a folly that bring me millions.........ha ha ha ha ha

I am sure the minions from the Independent Republic of the Canongate will be on tomorrow to tell you the decision was not democratic, the councillors were fools.......but these people are no-ones and they don't understand that profits must come before people.....ha ha ha ha ha ha

Stealing Scotland

10 days to go before planning committee votes on Caltongate http://www.eh8.org.uk/

Today Save Our Old Town Campaigners went through to see our friends in Glasgow for the very successful January Reshuffle, see City Strolls below for more information. A big thank you to Bob of City Strolls for organising a great day. Bob is person who embodies what The Common Good is all about. At this point in the reclaiming of the Scottish People`s Rightful Inheritance it is important that it doesn`t get hijacked by party politics. It is everyones inheritance and you have to remember that and be selfless and always thinking of the common good , not what it can do for you on a purely personal basis and in the case of councillors and msps etc their careers and votes.

The long awaited (since the end of 2006) CommonGoodReport of Edinburgh is to go before The Finance and Resource Committee on Tuesday 29th Jan. It makes an interesting read. Think smoke and mirrors.

Read all about the sorry state of Edinburghs` Common Good - ScottishCommonsEdinburgh

Its release prompted the following press articles Heraldarticle EveNews

Here is GlasgowsSorryState

Citystrolls Fantastic website for Glasgow`s citizens and what has gone here GlasgowLost

Cleansing and Clearances o' of Canongate

24 days to go

The Evening News journalists who now get paid to cut and paste press releases from the Mountgrange spindoctors PPS here, (Director Donald Anderson, ex-leader of the Labour Council) reported earlier on in the week that "homes" were to be saved here but for those that follow the Independent Republic of the Canongate know that is nae true, (indeed we think the proper term is LYING).

What is happen about housing is this:-

18 flats on the Canongate are to be demolished, 9 of them were owned occupied but were bought by the developers are rented out by Rettie and Co. 9 of them were owned by the council as council houses, they have been owned by City of Edinburgh since they were built in the 1930s by the city architect Ebenezzer Macrae as part of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1919 here. However the council have cleared 7 of the houses. leaving them empty i.e. no rent is being taken on them despite Edinburgh housing crisis. The council have not repaired the pavements from the top of New Street down past the Sailor's Ark and Macrae Tenements because it is a "regeneration area" despite the whole of the Royal Mile being down up.

The council's and Mountgrange's proposals are to get everyone out of the flats - they are solid, stone flats with balconies and a big drying green at the back, they are houses that would last another 100 years with a little maintenance unlike the housing built in the 60s and 70s - Westburn, Pennywell, Greendykes, West Granton etc that needed to be demolished. The Macrae tenements are highly sought after council housing. The flats are on the Royal Mile and have the No 35 bus stop right outside.

The flats are to have their back taken away, their insides gutted and there will just be the facade - the facade to the hotel i.e. the 5* hotel will look like 1930s council housing but it will be 5* luxury inside - I know it is crass! There will be no HOMES - only two luxury three bedroom apartments above the arcade part at Captain Jack's Close (next to Frescoes the roll shop) will be built by the developers. Obviously these luxury apartments won't be council houses despite having a council house façade. It is all the rage in London, tower blocks in Greenwich and Hackney being turned into executive's suites.

On the Mountgrange site which was the bus depot is where the hotel will be built, offices, shops and more luxury, executive housing fuelled by underground heating from the geothermal energy that is to be funded by the Department of Trade and Industry. There is to be NO affordable or social housing on the bus depot site!!

The developers have acquired land down on Calton Road which was council land and have got grants from Communities Scotland and are to be built by Places for People here. They are not doing anything that couldn't have been done by the council or any housing association yet they are being allowed to claim that they are building their quota of social/affordable housing - but in reality it is being offset and a bit of a scam. Oh guess what - this housing won't have access to the geothermal underground source heating paid for by your taxes!!!

Developers are meant to build 25% social/affordable housing in big housing developments - but offsetting is common i.e. they get into cahoots with councils to do things that would have been done anyway in order not to follow through. What the Independent Republic of the Canongate are saying - the area down on Calton Road should be social/affordable housing anyway and there should be 25% on the bus depot site. And the Macrae tenements should be preserved as people's homes - no more neighbours having to move away.

The Canongate historically had hundreds and hundreds of families and we would like more families in the area - it's a great place for families to live in but Places for People and the developers refuse to accept that three and four bedroom housing is needed. They tell us "families don't like to live in the city centre" yet the expensive flats and town houses are to be three and four bedroom with their own private parking.

It feels like social cleansing to us - our historical neighbourhood is being gentrified - and the traditional people of the Canongate are being cleared out here.

HOMES NOT HOTELS

Man bites Dog - Developers greeting cause they cannae dae what they want

Crickey - you couldn't make it up. What a lot of nonsense Edinburgh would not be recognised by someone who hadn't been here for twenty years - Greenside, Leith, Tollcross, Quarter Mile, Morrison Street, Lothian Road, Fountain Bridge, South Gyle, Edinburgh Park, Kinning Park, Hermiston Gate etc etc etc etc (as the King of Siam would say)- development all over the place!! Edinburgh is a modern city and there is no point scare scaremongering over this. If there are developments to be done in the world heritage site then there have to be caveats, the Old Town and the New Town have always been evolving but we don't need to evolve into a steel and concrete monstrosity on the altar of the God of Profit, Greed and Modernity.

City fears strict planning rules will chase developers away

BRIAN FERGUSON (bferguson@scotsman.com )

A MAJOR review of Edinburgh's planning regulations has been ordered in the wake of fears the capital risks losing out on major investment to Glasgow.

Jenny Dawe, the council leader, pledged to ensure the city's vast number of listed buildings and its array of conservation areas did not "inhibit" its development and economic growth.

Developers believe the city's UNESCO World Heritage status is used as an excuse for the amount of time it takes to deliver major schemes - and the protracted negotiations involved.

Officials have been asked to look at loosening restrictions, particularly in the World Heritage site, to help speed through big developments.

Now councillors are to get special training in the needs of developers and the importance of the city's economic growth in a bid to prevent major schemes being held up or blocked on the personal whims of councillors.

The council is under pressure from both sides over schemes such as the Caltongate development off the Royal Mile, the creation of a hotel in the Haymarket area and the city's waterfront.

Heritage groups have condemned the approval of a number of big schemes in the city in recent years, including the redevelopment of the former Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and the building of a new hotel on the Lawnmarket, because of their scale and design.

However, the property sector believes the city compares poorly with Glasgow, which promotes itself as "the most developer-friendly city in the UK".

Ms Dawe announced the capital's response to a gathering of the city's business community.

"Edinburgh faces the unique planning challenges of our World Heritage status, the huge number of listed buildings and several very large conservation areas," she said. "I've asked officers to review the raft of guidelines to ensure these do not inhibit progress and development in Edinburgh.

"We need to strike the correct balance between encouraging desirable development and protecting what makes Edinburgh so special."

Ron Hewitt, the chief executive of Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, said: "Manchester and Glasgow are both doing huge amounts of work to encourage development, and that's just not been happening in Edinburgh, where there's been a lack of vision and leadership.

"Glasgow is much more developer-friendly."

Cameron Stott, a director of the property firm Jones Lang LaSalle Edinburgh, said: "Edinburgh is a World Heritage site and we, quite rightly, must protect this status. However, there are plenty of examples around the world where a historic city embraces contemporary architecture and new development.

"If the new council does not encourage development, the city will not flourish."