Princes Street from Calton Hill.

Originally uploaded by stonefaction.

First Lew on League took to the blogosphere. Now, a contribution from my mother-in-law Vivien on Edinburgh’s new £3 million obstacle course:

Now this may not seem funny to any of my co-citizens, and particularly not to city-centre traders, bus users, drivers wishing either to enter the city, or to get to the train station or even to cross it to get out.

But it is true. The city fathers have spent £3 million on planning and implementing an obstacle course in and around the City of Edinburgh, making it so difficult to navigate that the police have refused to charge drivers who fail to obey all the new ‘no entry’, ‘no left’, or ‘no right turn’ signs, because they say (and for a change we all agree with them) that you don’t see the signs until it is too late to turn around. Or that they are downright dangerous, forcing drivers into left side lanes when they want to turn right. You can’t drive along the main road through town (Princes Street); the one looking onto the Castle. You can’t drive all along its parallel (George Street) ; wonderful wide street, with beautiful shops and cafes and plenty of room for parking in the middle and on the sides. Well, you can, before 10.30 and after 23.00. Neither can you any more enter either of the two beautiful squares at either end, Charlotte Square and St Andrews Square. The core of the world-famous 18th century ‘New Town’ has been chopped up into bite-size pieces. If by any chance you should wish to show a visitor around, you’ll have to walk the distance or take them on a night-time tour.

Which brings me to the inevitable subject of tourists. Most of arguments for these restrictions mention creating a more pleasant environment for tourists. But I guess they will soon be the only ones left to enjoy it. The residents have fled to the out-of-town retail parks or internet shopping, and former residents refuse to take up the maze challenge, most notably the city’s most famous son, Sean Connery. He gave the Edinburgh Festivals a miss this year, stating that he could no longer find his way around.

Edinburgh is a city built on rocks. It is also a world heritage city which would not allow for neat overhead ring-roads. We could tunnel our way through to ease the problem, and we could have improved public transport. But in the absence of either, the least we could expect for the £3 million would be some common-sense traffic planners.