Prestonfield House to Kilimanjaro

Prestonfield House Hotel to Kilimanjaro

Prestonfield House Hotel is amongst those in the hospitality industry who are planning to celebrate the highest Burns supper in the world.  They travel next week to the event which is sponsored by the haggis providing Simon Howie, and features Fred MacAuley and Michelin star chef, Andrew Fairlie.  

The event aims at raising £150,000 for charity  More details here.

Local New Year's honours

Local resident Donald MacRae

Here are some of those who have been awarded New Year honours and who live in or are connected with the ward:

• Professor Donald MacRae, OBE for services to enterprise and rural development in Scotland
• Graham Bell, QC, OBE for services to the legal profession in Scotland.  He was a member of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission which referred the Lockerbie bomber case to the High Court for review.

MercyCorps raise £200k for Pakistan

In August I reported the setting up of the Edinburgh Disasters Response Committee appeal to alleviate the effects of the floods in Pakistan.

Mercy Corps, the Sciennes based charity co-ordinating the fund reports it has now reached £200,000.  Details here.

Recycling Christmas trees

A reader asks about the recycling of Christmas trees.  Here is the advice from the Council website on the matter:

If residents would like their Christmas tree collected, trees should be presented beside rubbish bins or black sacks on the regular collection day. Due to the severe weather conditions, the garden waste recycling service is currently suspended. However, Christmas trees and garden waste  can be taken to any of the fourCommunity Recycling Centres for recycling.  . . The public can also use any of the temporary skips across the city for their old Christmas trees.

Festive waste arrangements

Keep your green bin out

My green bin was not collected today.  I see the Council website gives the following advice:

All green wheelie bins will be picked up during the week of 27 December but pick ups may not take place on the normal collection day.  There will be no wheelie binpick ups on 3, 4 and 5 January 2011.

The changes to green wheelie bin pick up dates are:

27, 28, 29, 30, 31 December - please put your bin out as normal and leave it there until we collect it 

Monday 3 January - please put your bin out on Monday 10 January

Tuesday 4 January - please put your bin out on Tuesday 11 January

Wednesday 5 January - please put your bin out on Wednesday 12 January

All other bin collection services will run as normal.

I hope this is helpful.  For trade waste, special uplifts, hours of the community recycling centres, red and blue box collections  - see said Council website here. 

Festive contact

It has been a busy few weeks and the snow has brought a large number of requests for assistance.  Below I list first Council contact arrangements and then how to contact me.  The Council has a clear escalation procedure for emergencies.

• Council contact:  During 25 - 28 December and 1- 4 January when neighbourhood offices will be closed urgently required services in relation to ice/snow clearance and gritting can be accessed through the contact centre (Tel. 0131 200 200)
•  Councillor contact:  I will not be in much during the next week but will be be checking emails from time to time.  My email address can be found here.

Finally, Happy Christmas to you all.  Now a little puzzle to be resolved on Christmas morning.  I have checked three weather forecasts for Edinburgh tomorrow.  Let's see which is correct.

• Netweather:  no snow

• BBC/Met Office:  a bit of sleet 9am to 12 noon

• Accuweather:  Some snow between 3am and 5am

Happy Christmas

Update 10:20pm: Accuweather won with a sprinkling of snow before dawn - though BBC/Met office did change their forecast late on Christmas Eve to make it similar to the Accuweather one.

The Odeon: Owner's view

Today's Evening News carries an article by Bruce Hare representing the owners of the property.

January 5th is the closing date for the latest round of offers in this long running saga.

The article can be found here.

Festival Theatre extension approved

Currently playing at the Festival Theatre

The Festival Theatre is to have a new rehearsal area built at the rear of the current building.  This is intended to turn it from a theatre which receives shows into one which commissions and develops.

In order to develop finance the development student flats will also be built on the ground at the rear.

Permission for both was granted at the Planning Committee this morning.  The planning application can be found here.

B'muir update 2: What happens next

Earlier today I posted on the funding implications of the announcement yesterday about redeveloping or rebuilding Boroughmuir High School.  Below I append another part of the Council briefing which begins to deal with the timetable ahead.

• The question of redeveloping on site or in a different location will be revisited.
• The expected (lengthy) steps required are laid out in brief
• It is clear there is no strong indication of when the work is likely to be undertaken or completed, particularly in the continuing uncertainty on funding.

The Next Steps
No work has been undertaken on the project since 2008 due to lack of available funding.  As a result, cost information for the refurbishment option dates back to feasibility proposals prepared in early 2008 which suggested a phased refurbishment and partial new-build programme on the existing site which was estimated to take six years and seven months.  This information now needs to be updated.


The refurbishment option would entail a very lengthy decant for the school.  Whilst the Fairmilehead site was discounted in 2008, other possibilities for an alternative site  on which a new build might be undertaken may have arisen in the intervening two years.  An assessment will therefore be undertaken of any available site options.


We will work with the school to establish the Strategic Educational Design Brief for the project which will include establishing the vision for learning requirements for space typologies and characteristics, faculty adjacencies and critical principles for design.  This process has been followed very successfully for both Portobello and James Gillespies and has been recognised nationally as an exemplar approach.  The resulting brief will be of key importance to determine the educational vision for the school before consideration is given to the physical aspects of the design and will be used by the architects as the basis for developing the physical design for the school.


Once all available options have been considered a report will be brought to Council regarding the recommended way forward for the project and for associated funding implications.

On The Line booklaunch at Sciennes

Launched 21.12.10

A unique book was launched today in the City Chambers with the help of 70 P7 students from Sciennes Primary School.

With the help of school parent and author Mary Thomson, the team of children have stuck to a six week deadline to take the book from initial concept through design and writing, to completed publication.  On budget and on time!   Well done.

Launch display

With illustrations from local artist Emily Katagiri, the result is (from the press release):

20 short stories written by the 70 authors, full of unfettered imagination and with concepts and challenges that jump out of the page.   The students have taken their heroes on an amazing journey, which resolves itself through recognising the consequences of their actions.

Authors at Edinburgh's  City Chambers

The book is published by local publishers Whitewater Publishing and it is available from Amazon for £6.29 or, if you need it for Christmas from Sciennes School office.

B'muir update 1: Funding uncertainty

Despite the fanfare yesterday, there is still considerable uncertainty, both about the funding mechanism and the timing, of the replacement of Boroughmuir School. Here is an update on the financing details consequent on yesterday's Scottish Government announcement.   The Non-Profit Distributing model is fundamentally a complicated way of borrowing money.  Alternatively you could describe it as a variation of PFI or PPP I will just post the relevant part of the Council's briefing verbatim with a few comments below:

Schools for the Future Programme
The City of Edinburgh Council has already benefitted from this programme; the replacement of James Gillespies being one of the first tranche of 14 secondary schools supported under the programme announced in September 2009.

Support for only two further secondary schools in Scotland has been announced at this time - Boroughmuir High School and Campbeltown Grammar School.  The announcement from the Scottish Government represents an excellent opportunity to progress this much needed replacement project.  The level of funding support we will receive we will receive will be based on the same criteria applied to previous schools, which, for a new-build school, would equate to between half and two thirds of the cost.


Non Profit Distributing Investment
As part of the rercent Spending Review, the Scottish Government announced the intention to take forward a new pipeline of infrastructure projects through a Non Profit Distributing (NPD) model which it advised would need to include some of the schools for which support had already been announced.  We have been advised that the projects to replace both James Gillespies and Boroughmuir will be supported through the NPD approach. 

The NPD model will allow the Scottish Government to provide their support on a revenue, rather than a capital, basis.  The details regarding how this model will operate require to be clarified and discussions with Scottish Futures Trust have already been initiated.  We will need to work with the Scottish Government and Scottish Futures Trust to establish the most appropriate route to deliver the projects.

If I understand this correctly the funding actual capital funding is well into the future and, instead of the 80% provided to local authorities via the PFI, the amount is now the rather ill-defined 'half to two thirds'.

Note:  I will post on the timetable implications later today.

Boroughmuir: the announcement

Co-ordinating press releases, Edinburgh's Education Department and the Scottish Government have announced this morning that Boroughmuir School is now to be 'supported for its redevelopment through the Government's Schools for the Future programme'.

Undoubtedly progress, but this announcement is very short on detail and it will be some time before we know how meaningful it is.   There is no timescale and clearly discussions on the nature of the redevelopment will now be able to restart.

The Council press release is here and the Government version here.

Getting information in the snow

Site of waste skips

Just a reminder that the council site for getting updates on schools, waste collections, roads and gritting can be found here.

Last week, in the Southside & Newington area most waste collections were getting back to normal.  But from what people have told me I know that is not the case in some parts of the city.  The accompanying map of skips - where you can dump rubbish yourself - may be helpful for some in parts of the city.  

You can get the full interactive map here.

Great Winter Run - 8th January

Now is the time to enter for the BUPA Great Winter Run which is held in Holyrood Park on Saturday 8th January 2011.  The 5k starts at noon with a wide range of other events.  

You can run it for charity too.   Details here.

School term dates 2012/13

Where to find school dates online

Edinburgh Council is consulting on proposed term dates for 2012/13.  Consultation details are here.  Any parents can express their preferences before the closing date of the consultation on 11th February.

Which brings me to school term dates for your new 2011 diary.  You can find the term dates from January 2011 here.

Education: all is not well

An article in the Evening News yesterday prompts a brief post on education.

First let me say I appreciate the great work done by many within our education system.  But overall our system is not working well.   The article in question was highlighting the widening results gap between best and worst schools in Edinburgh.   You can see my comments reported in the article.  (The suggestion elsewhere in the article suggesting that part of the answer is the  Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) - paying children to go to school - needs to be contested.)

It is our system which is jaded.  A system which has at its heart the mantras

• one size fits all, 
• the educational authority (or government) knows best (at least better than parents)
• we can freshen up our system with new initiatives (Curriculum for Excellence, 'self assessment' etc)
• process is more important than people

Certainly we need to change our system.  But it needs to be to a system which allows parents to make real choices (beyond just buying a house in a good school catchment area), and which allows teachers to use their creative initiative to educate - and be held accountable.

Note: The recent OECD report which suggests Scotland is slipping down the international league table is here.

Nativity at Craigmillar Park

There are two hundred nativity exhibits from around the world on show at Craigmillar Park Church.  They include a native North American Indian nativity scene in a tepee.

The exhibition is open 2pm - 4pm daily.   More details here.

Update 20.12.10:  I note an Evening News reporter has picked up the story and has dug up more information.

Primark looking good for Summer 2011

Although not in the Southside & Newington bailiwick, by popular request I reported in October the anticipated opening date of Primark's new store in Princes Street.

I see from council papers that the opening date is currently designated 'Summer 2011'.

Weather: The Inquest

First, a reminder that the latest information about refuse collections (back to normal runs this week, temporary skips in place), schools (all operating), roads, traffic and gritting information, vulnerable people information, can all be accessed from this link on Edinburgh Council's website.

The council meeting on Thursday (16th) will consider a report of action taken in response to the ongoing weather developments.  Here, in bullet form are just a few of the statistics and points noted.  (I expect the report will be posted in full on the Council Papers part of the website):

• It takes 180 tonnes of salt to treat all Category 1 routs and 90 tonnes for all category 2 routes (20 grams per square metre
• Edinburgh has 895 miles of roads and 1,721 miles of pavements
• Last winter's standing salt stock (5,200 tonnes) was increased by 38% to 7,215 this year.
• 4,800 tonnes of salt were used between Friday Nov 26th and Monday 6th December compared to 10,000 tonnes over the whole of last winter.
• There are 1720 grit bins in the city - one per 277 residents
• Because the snow came later than forecast on Monday 6th December, category 1 routes had been treated four times in the 24 hours before the snow actually began to fall

Gritting to date - your street

Here is a list of streets reported as having been gritted twice and, in most cases, scraped by the end of today:

 Whitehouse Loan from Newbattle Terrace to Strathearn Place – Strathearn Place from Whitehouse Loan to Greenhill Gardens – Greenhill Gardens from Strathearn Place to Chamberlain Road – Stratherhearn Place – Strathearn Road – Marchmont Road from Strathearn Road to Marchmont Crescent – Marchmont Crescent – Warrender Park Road – Sciennes Road – Sciennes from Sciennes Road to Summerhall Place – West Mayfield – East Mayfield – Priestfield Road – Clearburn Road – Prestonfield Road from Clearburn Road to Clearburn Gardens – Clearburn Gardens – Prestonfield Avenue from Clearburn Gardens to Clearburn Road – Dalkeith Road from Priestfield Road to Queen’s Crescent – Queen’s Crescent from Dalkeith Road to McLaren Road – McLaren Road from Queen’s Crescent to Cobden Crescent – Cobden Crescent – Cobden Road from Cobden Crescent to Queen’s Crescent – Queen’s Crescent from Cobden Road to McLaren Road – McLaren Road – Ventor Terrace  

 Oswald Road, Blackford Avenue from Oswald Road to West Regulus Road, West Regulus Road, Regulus Road to Findhorn Place, Findhorn Place, Grange Road from Findhorn Place to Seton Place, Dick Place from Seton Place to Findhorn Place

Observatory Road – Blackford Avenue from Observatory Road to Maurice Place – Maurice Place – Ladysmith Road – Blackford Hill Rise – Eva Place – Langton Road from Lussiewlaw Road to West Mains Road – West Mains Road from Langton Road to Blackford Avenue – Blackford Avenue from West Mains Road to South Oswald Road – South Oswald Road from Blackford Avenue to South Oswald Road (Blackford Brae School) – South Oswald Road from Blackford Avenue to St Albans Road – St Albans Road to South Lauder Road – South Lauder Road from St Albans Road to Lauder Road – Dick Place from Lauder Road to Blackford Road – Blackford Road – Whitehouse Loan from Blackford Road to Newbattle Terrace 

Her is a list of other information in the Edinburgh South area:

• Gritting teams are continuing to fill grit boxes and the neighbourhood team is also dropping of piles of grit for residents - grit is disappearing as quickly as it is distributed so residents are requested only to take as much as needed - we are very grateful for any assistance provided
•  Central roads teams have completed gritting category 2 routes and have started on category 3 - they hope to get around the category 3 routes over the weekend. There is an update list of routes covered attached to this email
•  If you or anyone in the area has specific concerns about friends, family or neighbours I would urge them to contact Social Care direct team at the Council on 0131 200 2324 and staff will arrange appropriate follow up. Email socialcaredirect@edinburgh.gov.uk . In the evenings and weekends, contact can be made with the out of hours service at 0800 731 6969.
• Some onstreet communal bins are now being emptied where possible and excess waste will continue to be collected; trade waste is running well
• If the thaw continues greenbin collection will commence from Monday - collection rates will be slow because they will uplift green and brown bins and also any excess waste. Residents are advised to put out both bins and bagged excess waste and if it is not collected on the normal day they should leave it out because the routes will be rolled over - communication for the wider public on this is in progress
• With the thaw a number of burst pipes/ roof/gutter problems etc are being reported. Residents should be advised to report this to 0131 200 2000 and the staff in the contact service will be able to assist 
• Sites for the waste containers in South now in 5 locations - Cameron Toll car park; Iceland car park off Ferniehill Drive; car park at 36 Prestonfield Avenue; pub car park at 50 Moredunvale Road and car park at Balmwell Care Home. More locations are being assessed particularly in the South Central area.
• Community Safety staff have been working with the police and Lothian Buses to arrange for cars blocking bus access etc to be removed - over 50 have been actioned across South to asist Lothian Buses reestablish bus routes

• Visits to sheltered housing residents at Ashton Grove and a number of dispersed alarm (DAS) properties   - 129 properties visited, nearly all residents were well with plenty of food etc which was reassuring
• The following community centres will offer a service over the weekend: 
•  Tollcross Community Centre - open this weekend for normal programme
• South Bridge Resource Centre - open as usual on Saturday
• South Side Community Centre - open as usual
• Inch Community Centre - open as usual  

• Newington Library open as usual 

Snow clearance work update           

•  Greenbank – clearance started  today - should be complete tomorrow morning (Sat) 
• Gilmerton Dykes –  this job is very difficult and time consuming and will take until Sunday to finish 
• Mortonhall - complete
• Ravenscroft Street - complete
•  Newington corridor footways –  ongoing over weekend  
•  Morningside/Bruntsfield/Tollcross footways –  almost complete. finish tomorrow
•  Pleasance – footway clearance working south
• Prestonfield Estate –  ongoing
•  Inch Community Centre/ Gilmerton Community Centre –  complete 
• Clearance at care homes – Gilmerton Care Home  cleared  
• Carnbee/Guardwell /Ellens Glen  –  will be worked on over weekend 
• Gracemount –  will be worked on over weekend
•  Laurison Gardens  - will be worked on over weekend
• Cluny Gardens/Oswald Road/Midmar/Kilgraston/Marchmont Road/ then over to Causewayside - footways will be worked on over weekend
• Alnwickhill/Howdenhall - will be worked on over the weekend
• Braid Hill area - will be worked on over the weekend 
•  Paladin bins in high rise and low rise have all been cleared now   

Prestonfield Avenue gets refuse skip

The Council is planning to get back towards full bin collections from Monday next week (13th).  Fuller details here.

Plans to provide skips available to residents at around 70 locations throughout the city are now underway and I understand there is now one  Prestonfield Avenue.  There is also one at Cameron Toll.

See the map here.   Ongoing information from the council during the 'weather' can be found on this page of the Council's web site.

Update  10:30pm:  the Prestonfield Avenue skip is in the car park at 36 Prestonfield Avenue.

Army invade Sylvan Place!

Sylvan Place - invaded

The army cleared the pavements and access around the Sick Kids hospital yesterday gaining quite a bit of attention.  Here is the article on the MOD website.

And you can see film footage of Squadron leader Jason Aslett and his troops here.

Odeon for sale: interest so far

Unoccupied for 8 years

Bruce Hare, of Duddingston House Properties, current owners of the former Odeon in Clerk Street, has been speaking to the press.

He has reported there are around 20 expressions of interest in the premises which was put on the market again in the autumn.  Today's article with more information can be found here and you can find some of the recent history of this building here.

No decision on Blind School proposals

Yesterday the Planning Committee considered the proposals to expand the Royal Blind School as I indicated earlier this month.

After the presentation of the details the Committee decided to undergo a site visit before taking a decision.

You would be forgiven for being confused about that if you had read the article in today's Evening News which reads as follows:

Blind school for expansion

Ambitious plans for a multi-million pound expansion of the city's Royal Blind School have been given the green light.

The application - which came before councillors yesterday - was for the first stage of the five year development, which will begin in 2012 at the earliest. . . 

The Evening News report is wrong.  No decision has been made.

However, whilst the application for planning permission is still very much in play, the Blind School has put on hold their appeal to raise funds for the development, pending the result of a Scottish Government review of education for children with complex needs.  You can find more details of that story. . . in the Evening News earlier this month.

Refuse collections plus skips introduced

 Collected 7:00am 9.12.10

This morning was a red letter day with communal street bins beginning to be emptied for the first time in two weeks.   The one pictured was (half) emptied manually by the bin men in Sciennes.

In addition 70 skips are being sited around the city to enable people to place their rubbish in them directly.   Alas, the map showing their locations - see here - does not show any in our area yet. 

Look up!

A slight thaw is forecast and in the early hours of tomorrow morning the BBC is currently predicting a bit of rain.

As we move to slightly warmer temperatures, overhanging snow on the roofs of tenements and other buildings is now evident in much of the ward.  As you negotiate snow and ice on footpaths, just keep an eye upwards as well.

BBC forecast at 07:00 Thurs

OK! Gifford Park at Buccleuch Street

Pavement ploughs, near Argyle Place, 7:26 this am

 

Continuing our small efforts to make an impact on a few areas Gifford Park in the Buccleuch Street area is the focus at 5pm tonight for an hour.  Come and join in with your spade.

Surgeries tonight

I will be at Southside Community Centre in Nicolson Street at 6pm this evening as usual for anyone who wishes to contact me.  I will also attend Cameron House Community Centre between 6:45 and 7pm (buses permitting!)

Community Council tonight

Second Wednesday of the month is usually Southside Community Council and Marchmont & Sciennes Community Council and they appear to be going ahead this evening as usual in the Nelson Hall and St Catherine's Argyle Church  respectively.

Correction 14:30:  The above has been amended and is now correct.  I had substituted Grange/Prestonfield for Marchmont & Sciennes.  Grange/Prestonfield has a December recess and their next meeting is in January.  They have no meeting tonight and their next meeting is in January.

OK! Lets dig out Argyle Place

This was Livingstone Place

Tomorrow morning is Argyle Place (east side!).  7:00 to 8:00am

If you need a car dug out or want to help clearing paths just come along.

Tomorrow between 5pm and 6pm it is Gifford Park's turn.

Bring a spade if you can  and any salt or grit you can.

Update:  For Gifford Park tomorrow we will try and do some of the icy pavements in Buccleuch Street.

OK! Let's start clearing Sciennes Road

Livingstone Place pavement

Here is the programme for pavement clearing so far.  Any one care to join it.  Bring your spade.

Quite a few people have got the clearing underway in Livingston Place as you can see.  Heavy work but progress is good.  There is plenty more to do and it will help enormously when the thaw begins - on Thursday?

Tuesday 5pm-6pm:  Sciennes Road at Sienna Gardens

Wed      7am-8am:   Argyle Place

Wed      5pm-6pm:  Gifford Park (from Buccleuch Street end)

Just turn up - with a spade if you can.

Reminder:   Click  here for the Council's latest severe weather updates.  And you can get the twitter feeds as well.

Halal at the Dragon Way

In October I posted on the Dragon Way Chinese Restaurant in South Clerk Street going Halal.  Here is another article from the Halal Market News.

The article contains much of interest including the estimate that 40% of UK chicken and 25-30% lamb consumed in the UK meets Halal specifications.

The rather innovative Michael Yip is the proprietor.

Sara McLean in Miss GB last 5

Local student Sara Mclean made it into the last 5 of the Miss GB competition in Weston-Super-Mare on Saturday night.  She was the only one of the five Scottish finalists to get through to last five.

I can't see on the Internet when the winner is chosen from the five.  Shona, can you help with more details?

Sara is an Edinburgh student who lives in the Southside and Newington ward.

Update:  Ahh.  Sarah, didn't quite win but made it as far as the last five - as Shona explains in the comments below.  Apologies for any confusion.

OK! Let's clear Livingston Place

A team of neighbours in Swanston Park

Join me in the streets below over the next couple of days at the times shown.   Or set up your own pavement clearing time and team.  I'll post details here.

There are quite a few accounts of streets being leafleted or door knocked and the menfolk (mainly) getting together to clear the pavements.  So for the next couple of days I'm putting aside the hour between 7am and 8am and 5pm-6pm to clear some pavements in specific streets.  Care to join me?  Or arrange your own work party.  Let me know and I'll flag it up here.  Here's the programme so far.

Tuesday 7am-8am:   Livingston Place  

Tuesday 5pm-6pm:  Sciennes Road at Sienna Gardens

Wed      7am-8am:   Argyle Place

Wed      5pm-6pm:  Gifford Park (from Buccleuch Street end)

Bring your spade and any supplies of salt you can spare.

When will it end?  The Met Office are predicting something of a thaw on Thursday and Friday but it will be a bit chill before then.  Predicting a maximum temperature tomorrow of minus 5 earlier today, the Met Office has now reduced the prediction to minus 3.  Even if it does thaw at the end of the week it will take a long time to shift the snow and there will be drains to clear. . . . 

Open: most schools, community centres

8am predictions

Today's list of schools and community centres which plan to open - and those which plan to stay closed - can be found here.

Last night the BBC weather page for Edinburgh showed 9 hours of 'heavy snow' from 6am.  

They have now (above) adjusted that to 3 hours from 9am with 'light snow' in the 6-9am slot and also in the 12noon to 3pm period.  You can watch the changes here. 

Update on Marchmont lights switch on

Yesterday I reminded readers of the carol singing and lights switch on outside Scotmid in Warrender Park Road today.   Council resources for switch on ceremonies have been diverted to deal with the snow.

There was an option of the gathering in the German speaking Church in Chalmers Crescent going ahead but as you will see from the Marchmont and Sciennes Community Council blog, that will not now go ahead.

Royal Blind School decision soon

It has been a long time in the plannning.  In December 2009 I posted giving details of an application by the Royal Blind School, Craigmillar Park, to extend.

The proposals, which can be found here (Application Ref: 09/03075/FUL), come before the Planning Development Management Committee next Wednesday (8th Dec).  The report, which recommends approval for the phase one works, can be found here.

St Patrick Square switch on is off!

The other St Patrick's Square - Auckland!

The normal carol singing, clebrity switch on of Southside Christmas lights in St Patrick Square is being bypassed this year.   Council staff are too busy clearing snow so the Christmas lights have just been switched on anyway.

Warrender Carol concert, now cancelled

On Saturday, pupils at James Gillespies Primary School will lead carol singing at the switching on of the Christmas tree lights in Warrender Park Road outside the Co-op.

The event will start at 4:30pm and will be followed as usual by mince pies and refreshments in the German Speaking Church in Chalmers Crescent.

Come and make it a party.

Update Friday 8:00am:  Along with most light switch-on events the Warrender Park Road event has been cancelled.  I'm still waiting to hear if the community get together in the German Speaking Church will go ahead.  I'll update here later today.

List for schools open Friday

Here is the list of schools, nurseries and community centres open on Friday.

44 of the 87 primary schools are set to open.  These do not include Prestonfield - and St Crispins will be closed as well.

Lady Road allotments has wee tip for gardeners

Lady Road allotments' secret revealed

Peter Wright is a name well known in spook circles.  His heyday was the 1980's when he retired from MI5 and wrote Spycatcher - revealing a few state secrets.

Our own local Peter Wright is revealing a more mundane secret to help with your compost!  The details are revealed here.

Congratulations

Remember what it used to look like?

Well done to all those who have made it possible to open Edinburgh schools.

Take my local school, Sciennes Primary.  I understand that with a school roll of over 600 there were well over 500 pupils in yesterday.  I hear that only two teachers did not make it.

Thank you to all those who made it happen.   Especially the Janitor!

Who polices our beat?

Collage of happy officers - your local PCs will be just as upbeat!

Below is the most recent list of local police officers for the ward.

• Prestonfield:  PC 4988 Mark Dickson
• Southside: Acting Police Sergeant Jeanette McCulloch; PC 5759 Graham Watt; PC 11249 Zoe Martin
• Sciennes and Grange: PC 5997 Janie Kay; PC 5903 Michael Loudon
• Rankins and Causewayside: PC 11032 Lynsey Collins; PC11113 Kelly Hurt

They can be contacted by email firstname.lastname@lbp.pnn.police.uk and the direct line to their office (not always staffed) is 662 5093.  You can telephone the police 24/7 by using the local number 311 3131 (which is the call centre at Bilston) or, in an emergency 999.  You can also email the local team of officers as a whole at adivsntsouthsidenewingtonATlbp.pnn.police.uk (replace AT with @).

In due course this page on the police website will be updated with the details I have listed above.

Hotel struggles with stables roof

Remember what the hotel looks like in summer? 

Prestonfield House Hotel is struggling a bit with the weight of snow on the marquee style roof of the stables complex.

Full details here.

Weather update

James Gillespies Nursery is now closed today.  (Similarly Craigintinny Nursery and Queensferry High School.)

The Forth Road Bridge is closed and I'm currently following a gritter (on the airport bus) homing in on Edinburgh Airport where little appears to be happening this morning.

Information about snow priorities

Some of the information in Tuesday's briefing for councillors may be helpful to know as you contemplate the condition of your streets and pavements.

All category 1 and category 2 priority routes were treated on Monday.  Due to continuing snowfalls it was necessary to revert back to category 1 routes.

On Tuesday, all category 1 routes were treated and work began on category 2 routes.

Category 1 routes are important principal roads and major bus routes, roads to hospitals, ambulance depots and fire stations.  Category 2 routes are all other main roads and local distributor roads.

And finally for this morning - salt. Between last Friday (26th November) and Monday night (29th), the Council used 1802 tonnes of salt.  A further 1001 tonnes had been used since the start of winter maintenance.  

As at early morning on 30th there was a supply in hand of 5374 tonnes.