DEBATE: Business owner versus active travel campaigner on Academy Street plans
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The divisions over Highland Council's planned revamp of Academy Street continues so we asked two representatives of the opposing views to have their say.
The chief point of conflict is trying to throttle off the number of vehicles by around 70 per cent.
- The 'preferred' option for Academy Street revamp seeks to bar most traffic from the city centre
- Controversial council plans to revamp Academy Street expected to cost £7.5 million
- Inverness traders say Highland Council is acting 'like a dictatorship' over Academy Street plans
- Businessman David Traill says Council's Academy Street plans threaten to repeat 'abject disaster'
So far the debate on that issue has settled into two camps – those who think it will be a good idea and those who think it will be devastating to trade.
Representing those who think the changes would damage city centre is Scott Murray, Managing Director of Cru Holdings, which owns a number of city centre businesses.
And from the active travel camp is John Davidson, convener of the Highland Cycle Campaign and an editor at Highland News and Media.
Scott Murray, Managing Director of Cru Holdings
The effects of pedestrianisation of the city centre in any way reaches far beyond the livelihoods of the businesses which operate within it.
You just have to look at Dingwall many years ago, or Aberdeen more recently to observe the severe and damaging, long-lasting effects it can have on the wider community.
Looking around Inverness city centre today, there are varied businesses. From supermarkets, furniture shops, domestic goods and much more. I don’t know about you, but I have never once put a fridge freezer on the handlebars of my bike to cycle home! The proposed restrictions really do call into question the abiity of people to park outside these types of shops, meaning that they will simply shop elsewhere – either with an online service or a retail park.
You might think that is harrowing for the business owner and you would be right. But lets consider the wider picture. These retailers employ people. No trade = no jobs = no tax being paid = benefits claimed = double negative whammy for the economy.
Businesses pay business rates. These rates go towards local public services. No business = no rates = further degradation of the city centre due to lack of funds to maintain and improve.
These are just 2 points of many, and again when we look at most towns that have opted for similar projects, they simply don’t have the utopian results they promised. The results are damaging and permanent.
John Davidson, convener of the Highland Cycle Campaign and HNM content editor
We’ve reached a bit of a crossroads in Inverness. The city is expanding so quickly that it can be hard to keep up.
When you build more houses and bring more people in, they tend to bring more cars.
There’s only one direction of travel if we keep following this road – our city streets will become more and more congested, like every other large town and city across the UK.
Academy Street is already pretty bad for traffic. It’s certainly not a place I enjoy going to. Walking down there, even with the temporary and slightly confusing widening of the pedestrian area, is a generally unpleasant experience.
The proposed development of this prime area of the city centre promises to breathe new life into what should be the heart of our historic city. If done properly, it should be a place people want to visit and spend time in.
This isn’t about cycling – it will add zero miles of properly segregated cycling lanes to the zero miles we have in Inverness today – but about making the city a cleaner and more attractive place for people to spend time.
The proposals won’t stop deliveries getting to businesses or ban blue-badge holders, but it will put an end to through-traffic which is unnecessarily clogging up one of Scotland's most polluted streets and bringing zero cash into our local economy.
There are plenty of details to be ironed out in future consultations, but on this issue I would agree with Councillor Ken Gowans, who said that this wouldn’t break our city, it would make it.
There’s an opportunity to make Inverness a forward-thinking city, one that puts people at its heart above traffic. I for one think we should grasp it.
