Councillor Angela Blacklock’s Blog

Leith Walk is one of the most important streets in Edinburgh, in fact I would argue one of the top 5 - Princes St being number 1. It is important not just because of it’s history but because it links the Waterfront to the city centre and the graceful curve of Leith Walk provides an example of stunning architecture and a beautiful vista.

It is very unlikely now that the tram will come down Leith Walk. This is a shame because the air quality is just not good enough especially for the children who live and go to school and nursery in the area. Leith Walk could have become a continental boulevard with hotels, shops, restaurants and bars open in the evenings.

If the decision is made not to have a tram going down Leith Walk in the foreseeable future, the trees which were taken away to make way for the trams must go back. We also need new pavements and central reservations and after that a programme to improve the shopfronts. Watch this space!

Also see a constituents blog on this subject: http://www.fayyoung.org/?p=1629

I am very worried about the plans to build a huge wood-burning biomass plant in Leith. It will mean dozens of twenty-ton trucks rumbling through Leith every single day, emitting dangerous particulates into the air (which cause asthma). The plant will burn huge amounts of wood pellets, shipped thousands of miles across the sea, which could be a serious setback to our efforts to combat climate change, because there’s no guarantee the suppliers would re-grow trees quickly enough to soak up the same amount of carbon released by the burning of the wood. There’s more information about the proposal and the implications for local people in Malcolm Chisholm’s letter to the Scottish Government about it.I am very angry that the SNP/LibDem Council is not doing more to stop this mammoth wood-burning power station, whose chimney will tower 120 metres over Leith. That’s taller than sixty-eight average adult Scotsmen (of 1.75m) all standing on each other’s heads!I’ve written with my objections to the Scottish Parliament and I’ve signed the petition on the website www.noleithbiomass.org.uk which is co-ordinated by Leith Links Residents’ Association ; I hope you will add your name too.

Happy new year everyone!  Christmas seems like a long time ago already but tomorrow (18 January) the Policy and Strategy committee of the Council will have a report from the Director of Services for Communities on the Council’s response to the severe weather conditions.

It has been reported that the Council spent an extra £6.4 Million trying to deal with these and the committee report says that apart from extra salt, the Council bought 5 lorries and 8 mini tractors.  I believe that the Council should invest in machinery to ensure we can keep our roads open and our pavements safe.  My worry is that the Council does not have the flexibility to easily move staff from one job to another.  For example, teachers should go to their nearest school if they are unable to travel to their usual place of work and the bin men should grit the roads and the street cleaners should grit the pavements or replenish grit bins.

The Lib Dem/SNP Administration of the Council is intent on privatising waste collection, this means that costs in severe weather circumstances will be much higher as private contractors will be far less flexible that our own Council staff.   This also means that we may not save money - the reason the Lib Dems and SNP use for privatisation but it will definitely provide a worse service to Council tax payers which is something that they are not even pretending to care about.

There is going to be a meeting on 1 December to discuss why Veolia should not provide Council services as part of a privatisation of Council services due to allegations connected with Veolia’s economic activity in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.  You may have heard that some Councillors are not going to attend this meeting which will be held at Augustine United Church, George IV Bridge but I will be.  I think the legal advice we have been given is on the over cautious side.  I think that the Councillors who have said they are just following this legal advice namely the Conservatives, Lib Dems and SNP, didn’t want to attend a public meeting about Veolia or the alternative business model proposals in the first place.

I was elected to Edinburgh City Council as the representative for Leith Walk Ward in May 2007.