Thursday April 10th 2025
Active travel improvements to George Street are among those in the capital that have been delayed.
Written by Local Democracy Reporter, Joe Sullivan
Concerns have been raised about projects designed to improve walking and cycling routes across Edinburgh after it emerged some had been delayed by as long as ten years.
City councillors revealed that 27 of 39 active travel projects being worked on by the council have slipped beyond their original completion date.
Greens co-leader and councillor Chas Booth group has urged officers to take action on the delays in an emergency motion.
It further said that funding and staffing resources, as well as some of the bureaucracy involved in building new infrastructure, was to blame.
The delays were made public in a response to a question at a full council meeting last year.
Among the delayed projects are improvements to active travel in Charlotte Square, which has seen its completion date pushed back from 2016 to 2027.
Meanwhile, active travel works on Fountainbridge and Dundee Street have been pushed from 2017 to 2027, and the cycling route from the Meadows to the Union Canal delayed from 2016 to 2026.
The Meadows to George Street project has seen its completion date shifted from 2022 to 2028, and improvements to George Street itself have been delayed from 2021 to 2029.
Some projects were listed as ‘on hold’ with no completion date, such as active travel works on the Powderhall Railway in Broughton.
And others are now under review’, such as the Portobello to Musselburgh route.
The committee convener did not accept it as an emergency motion, but the Green group can refile it before the next Transport and Environment Committee meeting after the council’s April recess is over.
If accepted and moved at the meeting, the motion would have called on council officers to come back within three months with proposals for reducing the delays.
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