The Edinburgh Reporter November 2021

15
travel and outdoor recreation in communities,
deliver outdoor learning, and connect local people
with nature.
JANET MCARTHUR
FRIENDS OF STARBANK PARK CHAIR
AS INDIVIDUALS, as members of our communities
and as a small part of our complex and clearly
changing Earth system, we all need to do something.
The good news is that we are all environmentalists
as we need to breathe and live on a beautiful planet
and we can all make a change even if it’s only a small
change. Whether it’s buying less or recycling more.
We are lucky to have a group of individuals who are
all committed to greener living and we all love our
walled garden. As gardeners we are naturally Wombles
- making use of the things that we find, things that
everyday folks leave behind - repairing our tools,
making new plants and trees by collecting our own
seeds, taking cuttings and splitting herbaceous plants.
We recycle plant pots, filling them with young plants
and donated house plants in exchange for donations
from our local community.
Our summers are definitely warmer and drier and
for the last few years in early spring it has hardly
rained as all. This has made us consider, sometimes
not knowingly, planting more draught tolerant plants
in the park such as lavenders, calendula, sedums,
eryngiums and the late season flowering rudbeckias.
We have fig trees (variety Brown Turkey) in the park
that are growing extremely well in these changing
climate conditions.
Ready for lift off!
EWEN MACLEAN
BLACKFORD SAFE ROUTES
OUR local community group concentrates on
addressing local transport choices of young people,
hoping to enable changes allowing them to travel more
actively and sustainably. Government figures indicate
that domestic transport accounts for 42% of CO2
emissions. The bi-weekly bike buses enable children
from James Gillespie’s Primary School to ride together
on the roads in a group with parents and ride leaders
to get to school safely. It is beneficial, not least for the
mental and physical well-being of the children, but
also in demonstrating to many parents that active
travel to school is possible. Many parents find the
roads too scary to cycle or walk to school, finding that
they feel that their only safe option is to drive their
children to school. To break this cycle what we
desperately need is infrastructure to facilitate the
modal shift from driving to travelling more actively.
SpACE project launched
to debate Edinburgh’s
built environment
By OLIVIA THOMAS
SPACE - the Space for Architecture +
Carbon + Environment - is a platform for
architecture, carbon and the environment
and it opens on 1 November just in time
for COP26.
It is regarded as a long-needed public
forum with a clear focus on how the built
environment is critical in addressing the
climate emergency.
There is a public pop-up exhibition,
event space and online venue open until
4 December in the former Fire Station at
Edinburgh College of Art – a highly visible
and publicly accessible venue in central
Edinburgh, and a great example of
re-using an existing building.
Other major cities including
Amsterdam, Bologna, Hamburg and
London already have established
architecture centres, and Edinburgh’s
SpACE has a unique focus on facilitating
public engagement with the role of design
excellence, place-making, heritage,
landscape and construction in the pursuit
of net zero carbon.
SpACE will enhance Edinburgh’s and
Scotland’s high level climate policies by
bringing them to life through talks,
workshops and displays about the
practical measures and behavioural
changes needed on the ground.
Rab Bennetts, architect and founder of
Bennetts Associates and Chair of SpACE
said: “There could hardly be a more
appropriate moment to engage with the
public about the impact of our buildings
and places on climate change. As the
world’s eyes are on COP26 in Glasgow, our
parallel event in Edinburgh can show how
the changes that are essential to our
homes, workplaces and public buildings
are not only possible but can also result in
a cleaner, healthier and more enjoyable
built environment.”
The exhibition will include inspiring
design and construction case studies
illustrating the journey to net zero carbon
in the existing building stock, new
buildings and neighbourhoods.
Backed up by carbon data,
these case studies will
illustrate where the industry
is and how far it has to go.
A daily events
programme will include
workshops by Historic
Environment Scotland
and Edinburgh
World Heritage
Trust to
presentations
of new
techniques in
commercial
Maverick
property, debates about existing building
upgrades, exploration of digital city
mapping, the work of the UK Green
Building Council, films by community
groups and consultations on The City of
Edinburgh Council policies.
The initial programme is intended as a
pilot for a proposed longer-term facility in
the capital and has been made possible
thanks to support from The Scottish
Government and organisations including
the Royal Incorporation of Architects
in Scotland.
Funding has been secured from the
National Lottery through Creative
Scotland, the Scottish Government,
Historic Environment Scotland, City of
Edinburgh Council, a wide range of
private sector companies representing
architecture, engineering, surveying
and construction, and several
individuals.
SpACE is a registered Scottish
charity and its steering committee
reflects its pan-sector ambitions,
comprising architects, engineers and
surveyors, and organisations
including the RIAS, Edinburgh
World Heritage Trust, City of
Edinburgh Council,
Architecture & Design
Rab Bennetts Scotland and the University
of Edinburgh.