These plans were the culmination of 18 months of negotiations between members of the church, ELC transport and planning officials, ELC councillors, the Community Council and the Fatal Footpath campaign. These talks came about at the direct request of ELC councillors keen to find a workable solution after rejecting the case for widening the main road pavement and extending the lights between the bridge and the church.
Planning Committee
Last Tuesday (4th Sep) locally elected councillor Jim Gillies (LAB), who now sits on the Planning Committee, argued that the new parallel footpath plans lodged had not been given sufficient scrutiny by residents of Pencaitland. Donald Grant (LAB), another local councillor said that this had been going on too long arguing that planning consent should be granted. At the vote Grant lost.
Plans in limbo
This means that work previously carried out on the site in preparation remains in limbo with no likelihood of the footpath being completed until further community consultations on both this existing parallel footpath plan and any varations or alternatives deemed viable. Crucially, anything presented to the community must be deemed acceptable to both transport and planning officials in East Lothian Council to avoid plans being voted down once again at Council. This is a task now being championed by recently elected councillor Shamin Akhtar (LAB).
Public Consultation
Once it is clear what, if any, alternative options may be viable, these, along with the current plans for a parallel footpath or variants of it, will be presented to the community. This will most likely be achieved with a public viewing in Trevelyan Hall and promoted via an information campaign to each household, as well as through this website and social media.
Long time footpath campaigner and mum Sheila Averbuch said, “Last year the ELC failed to widen the main road footpath despite well over 300 village signatures demanding they do so. The half finished parallel footpath through the churchyard was acceptable to the Fatal Footpath campaign as an alternative. I’m astonished that Planning Committee hasn’t yet approved it. I hope supporters of pedestrian safety will tell the Council clearly that they want the parallel footpath completed.”
RELATED CONTENT
- Pencaitland Fatal Footpath on Facebook
- East Lothian planning Application Summary
- Planning Committee Report recommending consent be given for the parallel footpath plan.
- East Lothian Courier story on the Planning Committee decision to reject Planning official’s recommendation.
- An earlier story when the Parallel Footpath proposals went to public consultation in March 2012.
- A map of the proposed parallel footpath.
Hi Jim
That’s pretty much what I think will happen. Personally, I think this has dragged on far too long and Jim Gillies’ intervention at the 11th hour simply adds yet more unnecessary delay and, perhaps most frustratingly, puts the kibosh on hopes of seeing a parallel footpath in place before the winter comes.
What’s now going to happen is that when the poor weather comes people will either get into their cars to drive kids to school with all the parking chaos that causes, or they will have no choice but to use the narrow main road footpath as the other possible route becomes bogged down in mud. (As you know, the road also has troughs of water that means anyone using the narrow pavement is in danger of being deluged when cars race past with little room to manoeuvre around these pools.)
So, hopefully, we will have yet more public consultation shortly and hopefully the outcome will satisfy our local political masters and finally bring about a positive end to this process!
If I sound somewhat disillusioned with this whole thing that’s because I am.
Cheers
Ralph
What level of public consultation will be acceptable to Mr. Gillies? Perhaps as an old school politician (one assumes) he might think a open public meeting or two in the Trevalyan Hall would have more value than any amount of cyber discussion and petition signing. Perhaps we should ask him. Otherwise the insufficient consultation card may well get played again.