This page last updated 16.10.98..98. Additions and Updates to this site  

Sciennes Safe Routes to School Group Reports  Action at Bruntsfield New Safe Routes Web site Latest news at Roseburn School Cycle Club EXCLUSIVE! Foreign Secretary supports Safe Routes and so does Edinburgh's only Liberal M.P. Schools plan great day out New Route At Royal High? Sciennes Safe Routes action Safe Routes Report on two Edinburgh schools Dundee Safe Routes SOCC Project new page 31.3  Article by Paul Osborne, Project Manager, Safe Routes to Schools for Sustrans Bruntsfield Primary School Pupils' and Parents' comments New newsletter  On Road Cycle Training Moves Closer Cuts in Edinburgh's Safe Routes Budget?  SR schools for '98/9 (update 11.2.98.)  Head Teachers' Attitudes to Cycling (revised 10.3.98.)  St. John Vianney's School progress (30.1.98.) Home Zones  SPOKES wins Cycle Challenge - so does Roseburn PS  Safe Routes update December  Bike racks installed   

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The Sciennes Safe Routes to School Group has published (14.10.98.) a wide ranging report detailing conditions around the school and calling for a measures to be implemented to encourage walking and cycling. Summary.

 

Action at Bruntsfield

The new layout is along the lines proposed by the school's Safe Routes Group, although the City Development Department was reluctant to reduce the road width sufficiently to prevent two cars passing each other in front of the school. Last minute intervention by Lothian Safe Routes and local councillor Sue Tritton got the planned width reduced from 4.5 metres to 4 metres. Work is due to be completed in time for the new term. The pedestrian phase in the lights at the Gilmore Place Viewforth Junction should also be working.

Lothian Safe Routes, which is part funded by the Scottish Office Cycle Challenge, has set up a new web site - Safe Routes Network to help keep existing groups in touch and encourage new ones to form. LSR co-ordinator Chris Hill says he expects it operate as a cross between a filing cabinet and a bulletin board.

Following last September's trip by over 90 adults and children from Bruntsfield Primary School to Spylaw Park a rerun is planned. To celebrate this year's National Bike Week the park is set to be invaded by children, parents and teachers from at least THREE schools - Bruntsfield, Sciennes and Stenhouse. In addition to a picnic and perhaps some football,this year there is the added bonus that people will be able to wander up the main street of Colinton village without the danger of speeding traffic.

Due to a landslip, the road is closed west of the bridge. The only traffic is residents and shoppers and the whole area is much more pleasant. Unfortunately it can't last - the road is of course too important to be shut for ever. Strange though that traffic has managed to find other routes through Edinburgh....

 

One development that the Royal High School's Bike Action Group would like to see is a new gateway into Davidson's Main Park at the corner of Queensferry Road and Quality Street. Leading BAG person Callum MacDonald says it would mean that he "could have an extra two minutes in bed". But it wouldn't just be Royal High pupils that benefited - it's clear from the width of the track that many people already walk this way and climb the wall and fence.

 

Local councillor Moyra Knox (pictured by the site of the proposed opening) is certainly convinced and she has contacted the Recreation and City Development Departments who "see no objections". Cllr Knox is also keen for people - especially children - to make greater use of the park. Royal High art teacher Kate Wheaton is proposing that the school initiates a project to help to improve the area.

Sciennes school project draws the crowds

 

Sciennes Primary School in Edinburgh celebrated the end of a four month project with a slide show which was presented to over 100 parents plus councillors and City Development Department officials.

 

The pupils have produced some wonderful work which impressed those present. They presented a "wish list" to local councillor Moyra Forrest who stated her support for some of the measures the children want to see. The main one is for the closure of Sciennes Road outside the school. This is likely to be supported by the nearby Sick Kids hospital. The Sciennes Safe Routes Group has begun to seriously campaign for the road's closure.

 

Bruntsfield Primary School Pupils' and Parents' comments

 

Last year a survey of travel to school habits and desires was carried out at Bruntsfield Primary School. A full list of comments has now been added to this site.

Safe Routes News

 

Lothian Safe Routes has published its first newsletter for Edinburgh. It has been sent to all head teachers and councilors and a wide range of officials and organisations concerned with promoting walking and cycling. If you want your own copy contact Chris Hill 229 0072.

 

On Road Cycle Training Moves Closer

 

The Scottish Road Safety Campaign has commissioned research into the delivery of Cycle Training in Scotland. The aim is to find how and where training is being delivered. Several schemes are in use including SRSC's own. In 1996 The Transport Research Laboratory concluded that the Scottish scheme was one of the more effective largely due to its on road training element - this is not at present carried out in Edinburgh.

 

Cuts in Safe Routes Budget?

Safer Routes schools for next financial year

Towerbank Primary in Portobello has a new head who is sympathetic to the idea of pupils cycling to school. At present many parents are using the narrow cul-de-sac to deliver their children by car, making conditions dangerous or unpleasant for others. The school is next to the Promenade where cycling is officially prohibited. Plans to allow cycling have run into local opposition.

A fourth school will be added shortly. The Council wants to target a school where accident rates are high. However it is an important feature of the Council's Safer Routes programme that Head Teachers are fully committed to the process. One HT has been reluctant to take part as he feared that his school would be stigmatised as having a bad accident record. It has since emerged that the Council's official figures may not have accurately apportioned accidents between two local schools.

The overwhelming majority of HTs who want Cycling Training for their pupils. This is one of the encouraging results of the recent SPOKES survey of HTs attitudes to cycling to school.

Over the past few months the "Safer Routes to Co-ordinating Group" has been meeting regularly. Most members work for the City of Edinburgh Council's City Development or Education Departments, but there are also representatives from SPOKES and Lothian Health.

The Group has produced "Guidelines for a Safer Routes to School Project" which will be used by the Council to run its "Safer Routes" projects with the chosen schools. The guide draws on the work of the SPOKES Cycle Challenge and emphasises the need to get the agreement and involvement of any school before any "Safer Routes' project is started.

The money for this financial year is being spent without all the recommendations of the Guidelines being in place. One school that has actively involved itself in the Safe Routes process is Bruntsfield Primary School. A recent meeting of the school's Safe Routes Group (BPS) highlighted several issues and suggestions for the £16,000 that has been earmarked for spending near the school in next few months.

• Widen the pavement outside the school in Montpelier.
• Give more pedestrian space on the pavements in Bruntsfield Avenue. This might involve pavement widening or just the ending of "end-on" parking where cars are able to overhang the already narrow pavement.
• Close Montpelier to through traffic preferably at the end of Bruntsfield Avenue, or at Viewforth.
• Pelican Crossing on Viewforth
• Trees and benches on the widen pavement outside the school.
• Improved lighting outside the school
• 20 mph zone in Viewforth
• Signs and feet marks to indicate the best routes to school from about half a mile away.

Bruntsfield Primary School won £250 in the SPOKES Cycle Challenge and is about to spend some on publicising the results and news about Safe Routes to all parents at the school. Some money is to be used to buy basic bike tools for the school and some may go on "half mile to BPS" signs.

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