Transport & Environment Committee
Presiding Officer to stand down
Law Society to become tenant at Atria One
Castlebrae’s electric car
Bees at Holyrood
The council’s Transport and Environment Committee meets at 10am in the City Chambers. You can watch it live or as a recording online.
The papers for the meeting are here.
One of the topics for discussion today is the future of Saughton Park and Gardens. There is to be a second round bid application to the Heritage Lottery Fund in September and today the committee will be asked to approve that.
The council has owned Saughton Park for over a century, first buying the estate to make room for the people moving into the Dalry area of Edinburgh so that they had ‘recreational’ space. The gardens were then the site of the Scottish National Exhibition in 1908 when 3.5million people visited. Early on the gardens rivalled the Botanics with the best collection of roses in Scotland but over the last 30 years the gardens have fallen into decline.
The original house, Saughtonhall was demolished in 1952 because of dry rot.
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The Rt. Hon. Tricia Marwick, Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament and MSP for Mid Fife and Glenrothes, has announced that she is standing down from Parliament at next year’s Scottish election.
The Presiding Officer said: “I have been active in politics since the mid-80s and for some of that time held down a full time job, looked after my children as well as campaigning. It is possible that the next parliamentary session will last for 5 years and, if so, I will be 67 when that session ends. I have been an MSP since 1999 and I am convinced this is the right time for me to leave the Parliament and frontline politics.
“When I was diagnosed with bowel cancer in 2013 it made me realise I wasn’t invincible. The sad loss this session of 4 MSPs from the 1999 intake has affected me deeply. My health is good and all my tests show that I remain clear of cancer. However, my family have had to make many sacrifices over the years and I want to ensure that I can spend more time with them, particularly my two grandchildren.
“As for the future, I don’t intend to retire completely and hope I can continue to make some contribution to public life in Scotland.”
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For almost 50 years the Law Society of Scotland has had its headquarters at Drumsheugh Gardens but now it is to become a tenant at the Council owned office development Atria One.
The move to Atria One on Morrison Street involves the complete sale of the Law Society’s current buildings on Drumsheugh Gardens. The new office premises will offer more modern and environmentally-friendly surroundings for staff and visitors.
Lorna Jack, Chief Executive of the Law Society of Scotland, said: “Our office move will help us to be relevant and effective in supporting our members, stakeholders and the public in the years ahead.
“After 47 years, the Law Society offices at Drumsheugh Gardens are increasingly unfit for purpose and expensive to maintain. That is why we have been reviewing our long term office location over the last year. Following that review, it is clear that moving to a new office represents the best decision.
The Law Society, which employs over 120 staff and works with over 400 volunteers, will occupy suites 1 and 4 on the second floor of Atria One, covering approximately 19,000 square feet. The Society has agreed a 15 year lease and plans to be operational in Atria by late 2015, following a fitting out period. Its current Drumsheugh Gardens premises have been sold to a developer.
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A group of 10 pupils from S4 at Edinburgh’s Castlebrae Community High School are building an electric race car from scratch which will then compete on the race track in East Fortune in September.
This innovative initiative, developed by Edinburgh College in partnership with Castlebrae High School and sponsored by Lamborghini Edinburgh, is aimed at engaging and inspiring young people to become the engineers of the future – giving them the chance to see some of the world’s most advanced supercars first hand while building their own electric car.
An expert Engineering instructor from Edinburgh College visits the school every week to work with the pupils on constructing the kit car which was sponsored by Lamborghini.
The pupils will be showing off their handiwork later today.
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The Scottish Government introduced bees to Holyrood last year in collaboration with Kelvin Valley Honey to locate two Scottish bred honey bee colonies at the Parliament.
The bees arrived in June 2014 and have taken up residence in the MSP Garden.
Depending on the summer weather the hives should produce between 80lbs to 120lbs of honey by September. Half of the honey will be retained by the Parliament and half given to Kelvin Valley.
Here are the answers supplied by the government to any questions you may have on bees…
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Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
