The City of Edinburgh Council is in the early stages of presenting a plan called Corstorphine Connections to improve walking, wheeling and cycling in the south Corstorphine area. So far, there are no plans to comment on but we would like to submit some key areas for improvement with respect to walking and wheeling around the area. 

LSE has walkability criteria that we have accessed against south Corstorphine and would like the following to be addressed for the scheme delivery. 

The pedestrian conditions in this area are currently very poor on some important streets and the entire area is dominated by traffic, making pedestrian movement difficult and unpleasant. 

Walkability criteria

Convenient pedestrian crossing points

St John’s Road 

Pedestrian crossing points are generally poor. We have timed some key crossing points:

Crossing over SJR near Station road Green man – 6 seconds  Waiting time – 1 min 20 seconds

Crossing over Clermiston Road at SJR Green man – 5 seconds  Waiting time – 1 min 28 seconds

This means a pedestrian heading along St John’s Road and looking to cross the road will have a waiting time of 2 minutes 40 seconds to get over one junction with 11 seconds to cross 6 lanes of traffic.

Crossing at White lady on SJR

• Green man – 5 secs 
• Waiting time – 1min 30 seconds 

This crossing is frequently used by pedestrians yet has a very long wait and mere seconds to get over the road. 

Suggested Action: Improve pedestrian crossing times on St John’s Road.

Saughton Road North

This is a fast and busy road. At the moment there are only two pelican crossings along this entire residential stretch of the south Corstorphine area, with a third (slow) pelican crossing point at the junction with Broomhouse Road.

Suggested Action: Additional pelican crossing point on Sycamore Terrace as a minimum. Improve pelican crossing time at Broomhouse Road.

Corstorphine High Street/Ladywell Road

This is a fast and busy road. There is only one pelican crossing along this entire stretch, which has a range of community amenities including doctors’ surgery, nurseries, primary school, church, greenspace and community hall.

Suggested Action: Upgrade pedestrian refuge to pelican crossing on Ladywell Road.

Meadow Place Road

The crossing treatment for getting over the junction at Meadow Place Road/Ladywell Road is abysmal for pedestrians. If you are heading to Tesco on foot on the south side of Ladywell Road you have to wait to get across five pelican crossings. Any pedestrian looking to cross this junction to/from Ladywell Road has no less than three points to cross.

Suggested Action: Assess this junction for improved pedestrian movement and reduce waiting times.

Traffic-light crossing points along this road are not very frequent. This is a busy and fast road with two high schools and should have better provision. 

Suggested Action: Provide pelican crossing on south-side of the overpass.

Non-traffic light junctions

Junction treatments throughout the area makes crossing the road difficult for pedestrians. Junctions often have wide bellmouths, lots of traffic, narrow pavements, poor road surface and a lack of dropped kerbs. They also sometimes have poor sightlines. 

Problem junctions include:

Ladywell Avenue/Featherhall Avenue Manse Road/High Street Kirk Loan/Sycamore Terrace Dovecot Road/Ladywell Avenue Drum Brae roundabout

Dovecot Road/Meadowhouse Road Castle Avenue/Tyler’s Acre Road Meadowhouse Road/Lamp Acre Road Ladywell Road/Meadow Place Road

Suggested Action: Tighten junction radii, provide continuous footway across residential junctions feeding onto High Street, Ladywell Road, Saughton Road North, St John’s Road.

Pavements

Pavements throughout the south Corstorphine area are less than minimum width as described by CEC’s Street Design Guidance. 

Some important pedestrian desire lines have incredibly narrow pavements. Problem streets include: 

Manse Road Station Road Sycamore Terrace Corstorphine High Street Ladywell Road Ladywell Avenue

Featherhall Avenue Sections of St Johns Road Sections of Saughton Road North Kirk Loan Meadowhouse Road Sections of Meadow Place Road

Generally, most residential streets in the whole south Corstorphine area are narrower than 2 metres as a bare minimum as per Street Design Guidance. 

Suggested Action: Widen pavements on key pedestrian thoroughfares and desire lines, especially around schools and retail.

Pavement clutter and barriers are common. Examples include:

• Residential bins on St Johns Road
• Much pavement clutter on St Johns Road, which we covered in our pedestrian clutter audit of the area and submitted to CEC
• Guardrails at north end of Kirk Loan, the south ends of Meadow Place Road and Saughton Road North
• Guardrails narrowing access points on toucan crossing on Meadow Place Road
• Barriers on Quiet Route 9 at Ladiebridge, Traquair Alley and the Paddockholm.
• Steps to access Traquair Alley from Corstorphine Road
• Bollards at junction between Station Road and Meadowhouse Road

Suggested Action: Remove clutter, barriers and guardrails, replace wheelie bins with communal bins on St John’s Road

Pavement parking and parking across dropped kerbs is another common problem. Hotspots for this behaviour include: 

• Pavement parking on Corstorphine High Street (so common you can see it on Google Streetview)
• Pavement parking on north section of Kirk Loan, especially next to the retail units (so common you can see it on Google Streetview)
• Parking over dropped kerb on Broomhall Avenue (so common you can see it on Google Streetview)
• Pavement parking throughout much of Carrick Knowe.

Suggested Action: Provide double yellow lines over dropped kerbs to stop inconsiderate parking, widen pavements, if appropriate and not cluttering pavement provide bollarding to stop pavement parking

Quality of footway surface can be poor, due to lack of maintenance and pavement parking. Some examples of this include: 

• South side of Meadowhouse Road from Saughton Road North junction.
• Tree roots rendering the off-road path at Pinkhill difficult to negotiate for people who require mobility aids
• Featherhall Avenue
• Most of Carrick Knowe residential streets

Suggested Action: Improve footway surfaces

Other points of note

LSE Edinburgh members live in this area and are aware of the following “rat runs”, that make getting about as a pedestrian more difficult. We think it is important these cut throughs are addressed, as they increase traffic in the area and make residential streets less accessible for walking and wheeling. 

• From Saughton Road North, cutting through Meadowhouse Road, Pinkhill to Corstorphine Road (and the opposite direction).

• From Saughton Road North, cutting through Castle Avenue, Ladywell Avenue (south) to Meadow Place Road (and the opposite direction).

• From Saughton Road North, cutting through Dovecot Road, Ladywell Avenue (south) to Meadow Place Road.

• From Corstorphine High Street, cutting through Manse Road to St John’s Road. 

• From Corstorphine High Street, cutting through Featherhall Avenue to St John’s Road (and the opposite direction)

• From St John’s Road, cutting through Kirk Loan to Sycamore Terrace.

• From Meadow Place Road, cutting through Featherhall Crescent South and Featherhall Avenue onto High Street.

• From Saughton Road North, cutting through Corstorphine Park Gardens, Station Road onto St John’s Road (and the opposite direction).

• From Saughton Road North, cutting through Meadowhouse Road, Station Road onto St John’s Road (and the opposite direction).

Some of these driver cut throughs are particularly problematic for families looking to walk to school. Featherhall Avenue, Ladywell Avenue, Kirk Loan and Manse Road are problem streets for families walking to Corstorphine Primary School. Meadowhouse Road is problematic for Carrick Knowe Primary School. 

Suggested Action: Introduce filtered permeability to keep rat-running drivers to main roads.