Many groups and organisations have framed their views in writing ahead of Thursday’s debate on the proposed north-south tram extension.

This is due to be debated at the Transport and Environment Committee on Thursday.

It follows a consultation on the line from Granton to Edinburgh BioQuarter, and market research commissioned by the council – all of which was reported on in the summer.

The council is recommended by officers to park the northern part of the line from the city centre to Granton and concentrate on the southern part only to Edinburgh BioQuarter.

There are 3-4,000 homes planned for the Granton Waterfront development, most of which is being constructed as a low car neighbourhood.

The Transport Convener said to media last week that he favours the route along the Roseburn Path. It is only now that he has finally made his view public.

Cllr Jenkinson said: “I have decided, based on the Strategic Business Case, the consultation results and the market research that the most appropriate route to the north is through the Roseburn Path.”

Asked if the council recommends that the tram extension to the north of the city proceeds, Cllr Jenkinson replied that the council officers recommend prioritising the southern leg of the route. He continued: “There are some challenges around the northern leg – more political than technical. We need to recognise that without political consensus delivering on any project is quite a challenge.”

Funding for the tram extension will not in the Convener’s view come from the council coffers. He said: “I have been clear that the taxpayers of Edinburgh won’t solely be on the hook for the future tram extension.I think these sums of money that we are talking about are actually unrealistic for Edinburgh to fund in isolation. I mentioned Clyde Metro – and Glasgow City Council are not being asked to fund that. I think we need to ensure that we do secure funding and that is likely to be from multiple sources – whether it is The Scottish Government, The UK Government or a combination. But I think that for a project of such local, regional and national importance I think we need support to be able to deliver it.”

Deputations

Spokes the cycling campaign group has not before issued a view on either of the northern options, but is conditionally supportive of the entire route being extended. They say their members are divided. They call for cycle segregation on the Bridges route, and use the opportunity to remind councillors that it took three years to revise the layout at the Foot of the Walk to accommodate safer cycling. There was no space provided for a protected route to Ocean Terminal, and even now only the first part of that cycleway to Dock Street has been built with no date set for the final section to Ocean Terminal.

Scottish Enterprise supports prioritising the southern section of the line saying it is “critical economic infrastructure” and it is essential to unlocking the BioQuarter’s potential. The body outlines that there are a possible 9,000 jobs in that area with a mix of 90,000 square metres of life sciences space and 1,500 to 2,000 homes.

Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce has come out strongly to support the southern part of the line but warns that the council must not abandon the Granton line – arguing for “sequencing not abandonment”.

Granton and District Community Council have penned an open letter to councillors, and are, understandably, pro the Granton route. They claim that decades of local masterplans have been predicated on a tram connection and leaving that route unfinished will leave the new Granton Waterfront isolated. They allege that the anti-Roseburn Path route campaign is led by more affluent residents, saying it does not reflect the views of local people who have been promised a tram service. The community council backs the compromise of single-track running with an active travel path. This would be made possible by running trams on battery power for some of the way – below bridges for example so that the pantograph can be lowered and less engineering would be needed.

The Capital Rail Action Group (CRAG) wants the council to retain the ambition of building the entire route. While the group is realistic about concentrating on the southern leg, it argues in favour of the Roseburn Path option to the north saying it is the only efficient route – and it avoids what could be costly utility works. The group also propose an innovative way of joining Newhaven to Bioquarter with a line running up Leith Street to join the southern leg.

National Galleries of Scotland have long planned the multi-million pound Art Works free to visit gallery development housing the national collection in Granton with funding of £56 million from The Scottish Government and £8.5 million from the Heritage Fund. Anne Lyden, the Director-General of National Galleries Scotland, has written to councillors on TEC to implore them to reconsider. She said that “the proposed tram connection would play a vital role in improving access to North Edinburgh and to major national cultural assets being developed within the Granton Waterfront area.”

Save the Roseburn Path are against any development on the former railway path, despite the many accommodations which the newer design promotes.The group is made up of diverse interests combined say that a tramline using the path would cause irrevocable ecological and biodiversity harm. It would mean a “loss of 600,000 journeys” each year. They seek alternative solutions such as routes along Belford Road past the National Galleries of Scotland: Modern, Stockbridge and bus rapid transit.

Just as the consultation went live in August 2025, John Thomson, a supporter of Save the Roseburn Path campaign, asked The Edinburgh Reporter to meet him to speak about the campaign which had been active ahead of the tram consultation beginning on 25 August 2025.

In the interview he agreed that the campaign had been running without knowing the full details of the council proposals to extend the tram northwards to Granton where 3,500 homes are to be built.

He said he is a regular cyclist on the path and does not use the tram, and that the campaign is not for or against tram – simply one to save the green space on the path.

The deputation from Looking for Growth, which calls itself the fastest growing political movement in the UK, is truly a “Johnny come lately”. The organisation is based in London with a local presence (we are aware of two people who feature in their videos) and it has just started to make a noise on social media in the last few weeks in favour of retaining the tramline north to Granton. The group is run by Something Completely Different Ltd, a company with one director – Lawrence Newport – who is also a director of Crush Crime Limited currently campaigning against phone theft in London. There are hints of a connection to former Downing Street Chief of Staff, Dominic Cummings, although we have been unable to verify these claims.

Calum McCutcheon of the Edinburgh “chapter” of the campaign group, Looking for Growth, says in the written submission: “You are being asked to cut off half of the deprived communities who would benefit from this massive investment, until unspecified further work can be done. But no amount of “further work” will unearth a secret third route to Granton. The Orchard Brae route is not viable – we’d spend 50% more whilst getting fewer riders and slower journeys as trams get stuck behind cars. The genuine concerns about the Roseburn Path have already been accounted for: the path will remain, and adjacent active travel routes will be enhanced. The “further work” which needs to be completed before construction is entirely political – standing up for the northern extension that will keep our city moving and growing, in an equitable and climate-friendly manner.”

For a map of the tramlines both present and proposed click here. It has been produced by Harry Williams of CityScope.

While he is not an organisation and so cannot submit a deputation, Harry Williams has written a comprehensive article about the case for Granton Trams on his site here.

He said: “The officers’ recommendation going to committee on 10 September would put the southern extension first, with further work on the northern routes required. The Royal Infirmary and BioQuarter need better connections. So does Granton. The city should not need to turn that into a competition between the people who use them.”

Funding

Current estimates for the extension of the 12 to 15 km line are anything from £2 to £2.9 billion depending on the final route. Notionally according to the SBC this is £160-200 million p4r km. These estimates have been confirmed in the report as comparable to earlier tram projects at this stage. (The figures are considered to be higher than they will eventually turn out after the route is finalised.)

The report before councillors estimates that there would be around 14.5 million passengers using the new north-south tramline in the first year – which ranks highly when compared to other UK mass transit systems.

The report states: “The 4.7 km extension to Newhaven was delivered at a cost of approximately £207 million (around£44 million per km). Line 1 , running from Edinburgh Airport to the city centre, cost around £776 million for 14 km (approximately £55 million per km), with total expenditure rising to just over £1 billion (around £74 million per km ) once financing and overruns are included. However, these figures are not directly comparable . Line 1 required substantial upfront investment in network -wide assets , including the Gogar deport, control centre and an initial fleet of 27 trams, while the Newhaven extension benefitted from these sunk costs.”

As part of The Scottish Government Budget 2026/27, the Cabinet Secretary for Finance identified a mass transit system for Edinburgh as a priority under the Infrastructure Delivery Pipeline. This was also referenced in Scotland’s National Transport Strategy Fifth Delivery Plan’s published March 2026).

The members of the Transport and Environment Committee are:

Roseburn Path option drawn up by The City of Edinburgh Council


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