Since we wrote our first article about Barclay Corner, things have progressed a bit further.
Local resident Heather Goodare and architect, Neil Roger, have now had a site meeting with council Parks Officers to sort out one or two final details of the specification, and the council have sent the campaigners a letter formally approving the project. You can see Heather in our film below.
Neil has also prepared his latest version of the plan for the area for which they still need funding. The group have agreed to apply for money from Waste Recycling Environmental Network (WREN), but they need your help. The basis on which funding would be made available would be that there is sufficient community support, so there is a petition to be signed. The best way to organise this is to have a look at the plans on the Friends of Meadows and Bruntsfield Links website and go to the online petition.
Local MP Ian Murray said:-“The Barclay Corner project deserves support for the improvements it will achieve to this important gateway to the Brunsfield Links and the Meadows. Additionally, it should be supported as it cannot be underestimated the tremendous contribution Heather, Neil and the rest of their friends and colleagues have made to the area through their passion for the Links and the Meadows. Without their tireless years of dedication and resolve the area would be a far poorer place for the local community and wider City to enjoy. I hope everyone continues to support them and FoMBL in their endeavours.”
A spokesman for Barclay Viewforth Church explained how it fits in with their own plans:-“We were pleased to give our support as a congregation to FOMBL’s proposals for the Barclay Corner. The church is a significant part of the city’s architecture and the current surroundings don’t show it to best effect.
“By Christmas we should have completed work on the steeple which will see the main red doors at the front of the church, unused for a number of years, being reopened. This has been an ambition for a while – it seemed unfortunate that what was founded as a “mission” church looked closed to passers by. This work comes on the 150th anniversary of the laying of the building’s foundation stone (in October 1862), and it would be good to see the newly lit and refurbished steeple complemented by a makeover of the nearby Meadows area.”
Founding Editor of The Edinburgh Reporter.
Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
