Wednesday August 27th 2025
AMT Vehicle Rentals on Clerk Street, Dalkeith
Written by Local Democracy Reporter, Marie Sharp
A car rental firm has been barred from parking on the streets around its site amid concerns about its impact on a busy highway.
AMT Vehicle Rentals had applied for retrospective planning permission for change of use of their Loanhead base which used to be a builder merchants.
However the local community council objected, raising concerns about parking on the surrounding roads and safety.
They claimed transporter vehicle visiting the business, which is based off Clerk Street, parked on the road blocking driveways and junctions.
A meeting of Midlothian Planning Committee this week agreed to give the new business the go ahead but introduced a condition aimed at ensuring no vehicles connected to the business could be parked on public roads within 300 metres of the site.
The condition was welcomed by Councillor Peter Smaill who acknowledged that officers had “gone the extra mile” to try and ensure the rental firm did not add to congestion on the busy streets.
AMT Auto’s operations director Dave Hinchcliffe had responded to Loanhead and District Community Council’s concerns saying any transporter visit occured just once a month and pointing out the public do not visit the rental site.
The company said staff delivered and collected their fleet of vehicles to customers and that 40 parking spaces on site were enough for AMT and employee vehicles meaning none of them would be parked on the street.
It added: “AMT supply long and medium term rental vehicles to businesses, and the site has been leased to store the vehicles and deliver on to businesses.
“Typical vehicles consist of electric cars, plug-in hybrid cars, small standard cars and some 4×4 pick-up trucks. The average volume of deliveries per day will be 5-10, with opening hours 8am-6pm week days and 8am-12pm Saturday (closed Sunday).”
The committee granted the change of use with the condition “No vehicles associated with the use shall be parked on any street within 300metres of the application site”.
It added the reason was “to ensure that the use does not have a significant adverse impact on the road and pedestrian safety in the area because of inconsiderate parking and as there is already significant pressure on on-street parking in the area. ”
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