Letter: Rethink needed

It APPEARS Edinburgh city centre is once more to become a living experiment (your report, 23 February). Changes are to be made, at great expense to residents, but with no idea as to whether they will benefit the city. If it does not work, then it will be changed.

The citizens have suffered from half-baked grand ideas created by outside consultants, employed by the council, who do not have the local knowledge to do the job. The latest plan for Princes Street is too late. Any plan should have been up and running before the tram tracks were laid, and any citizen could have told the council that for nothing. We have had years of plans and ideas with no co-ordination or proper consultation. The most important aspect of any Edinburgh plan is the buses, but now these must play second fiddle to a tram line (not a tram system). Once the buses are accommodated, then look to other aspects. If it means pricing cars out of the city, then do so and offer free buses; you cannot increase the footfall by ignoring the buses. Let's get some grown-up thinking applied - please.

IAN ROSS

Eden Lane

Edinburgh