Tag Archives: Public Meeting

Notes of Living Streets Edinburgh Group Annual Public Meeting

Notes of Living Streets Edinburgh Group Annual Public Meeting, Friends Meeting House, Edinburgh, 7.45pm, 11 October 2018

  1. Convenor’s welcome and report

David Spaven welcomed supporters to the meeting and summarised the Group’s activity over the past year. A number of achievements and welcome developments included:

  • The Council agreeing to a complete ban on ‘A-boards’ (from 5 November)
  • Progress on the ‘Festival Streets’ campaign, to make more car-free streets in the Festival, with the partial closure of Cockburn Street, and the prospect of wider closures in 2019
  • Encouraging signs that routine maintenance works will introduce significant walking improvements (Signals team design for the Lothian Road/Morrison St junction)
  • We’ve produced a ’10-point plan’ to influence the City Centre Transformation initiative
  • collaboration with Spokes on planning and transport schemes, including the importance of providing separate (not shared) walking and cycling space.

On the other hand, there had been some disappointments:

  • The Picardy Place/Leith Street debacle
  • Failure to widen pavements significantly in major works on South Bridge/Nicolson St
  • endless cycle consultations, almost always involving some shared cycle/walk space (although also usually with some walking improvements)
  • the review of walking and cycling safety on the current tram route ignored walking entirely
  • continued planning approvals of traffic-generating sites, over-provision of parking etc.

Looking to the year ahead, David highlighted some key LSEG priorities as to:

  • monitor the implementation of the A-board ban
  • press for more car-free Festival Streets
  • have a ‘Walking Champion’ appointed by the Council
  • press for more progress in implementing the Active Travel Action Plan
  • contribute to the City Centre Transformation Initiative.

David then introduced and welcomed Daisy Narayanan, who has been seconded from Sustrans to lead the City Centre Transformation Initiative.

 

  1. Daisy Narayanan presentation

Daisy spoke about the vision for the project, which brought together a range of complex projects and initiatives, all at different stages. The aim was to provide a coherent vision to guide the development of the city centre across all parties and professional disciplines. The initiative will also embrace development of the Low Emission Zone and the City Mobility Plan (transport strategy). The starting point was that with a growing city (at least 100,000 more people by 2040) the status quo is not an option in terms of how people, goods and services function and move about the city. Daisy emphasised the importance of walking (No.1 of 15 issues) and of equality and inclusion, so that no one was excluded from being able to enjoy and participate in the city’s life.

Daisy took a number of questions from the floor including on the challenges that she faced and on whether planning policy was sufficiently joined up with the emerging vision.

 

  1. Workshop sessions

The meeting then broke into three informal groups to look at three issues that were part of the City Centre Transformation challenge: Accessibility, Strategic Walking Routes and a Walkable City. Points noted included the need:

  • for better understanding of pedestrian movements, including data on where people walk
  • to focus scarce resources on street improvements (wider pavements, easier road crossings, decluttering, pedestrianisation, tree planting etc) on busy walking streets
  • to maintain and manage improved streets and public spaces.

David Spaven closed the meeting by thanking everyone for their participation and promised that a note of the meeting would be sent to everyone who had left their contact details.

LSE Group – Annual Public Meeting 2017

Thursday 28 September at 7pm
Quaker Meeting House, 7 Victoria Street EH1 2JL

You are invited to attend the 2017 Public Meeting of Living Streets Edinburgh, the local voluntary arm of the national charity campaigning for ‘everyday walking’. We’ve had a busy year, raising the profile of walking in the city, and engaging with Councillors and officers of the City of Edinburgh Council on a wide range of public realm issues.

Come along to catch up on our news, to hear from the new Convenor of the Council’s Transport and Environment Committee, and to feed in your ideas to workshop sessions on walking route campaign priorities for the city centre and localities across Edinburgh during 2017-18.

AGENDA:

18.40 Registration; tea, coffee and biscuits

19.00 Welcome and update from David Spaven, Convenor of Living Streets Edinburgh Group

19.10 Keynote address by Cllr Lesley Macinnes, Convenor, Transport and Environment Committee, CEC

19.30 Question time

19.45 The national perspective from Stuart Hay, Director of Living Streets Scotland

19.55 Workshop sessions:

  • Topic 1: Identifying strategic walking routes in the city centre and key pinch points / barriers
  • Topic 2: Identifying strategic walking routes in localities across the city and key pinch points / barriers

20.20 Swop workshop sessions

20.45 Sum-up

21.00 Meeting closes.

Annual Public Meeting – Tuesday 28 June

LSE-AGM-2016

Living Streets Edinburgh Annual Public Meeting

Tuesday 28 June from 6pm – 8pm
Registration, tea and coffee from 5:40pm

Friends’ Meeting House, Victoria Terrace
Enter from George 4th Bridge. Lothian Bus 23, 27, 41, 42

Delivering World Class Streets for Edinburgh: The Next Steps

Agenda

Welcome – David Spaven, Convenor Living Streets Edinburgh

Tollcross Street Audit: results and next steps – David Hunter, Living Streets Edinburgh

Walking: The National Situation – Stuart Hay, Director Living Streets Scotland

Improving Edinburgh’s public realm: challenges and opportunities – Paul Lawrence, Executive Director of Place, City of Edinburgh Council

Campaigning Workshops
A World Class Edinburgh: big asks for Council Elections 2017
Action at street level: how to declutter Edinburgh’s streets

Plenary and summing up