Restalrig Road and Summerfield Gardens - Campaign Day 7

Speaking to residents in Restalrig Road, Summerfield Gardens and Gladstone Place today I was given a better idea of some of the issues in the area. Restalrig Road is a very attractive street with a lovely view from the hill looking West. Summerfield is a pleasant street that opens into the Links, and Gladstone Place is a collection of stately tenements that gaze onto the Links.

Residents spoke of some familiar issues:

Anti-social behaviour in the street and young people gathering at street corners being intimidating have been problems. Most residents said that it was a lack of something to do. Nonetheless, there had been vandalism of cars and cracked windows because of people throwing stones at houses. I do not think that a lack of something to do can excuse gratuitous vandalism: the Links is only 50 metres away.

Prostitution was cited as a problem at the bottom of Restalrig Road. A phone box was being used, and, so one resident told me, had her stair. (It had no intercom entry system.) This has been a persistent problem though residents have always been sympathetic to the women themselves.

The Prostitution problem was shifted from one area to the above streets. It was done for the sake of new developments and people maintaining their house price value. But the same argument applies to these streets.

I believe a strong residents campaign, persistent use of CCTV and police resources, can move the problem further East to non-residential areas of Seafield Road. This will save the area from the feelings of intimidation that some people, especially female dog walkers at night, have experienced; it will also stop this part of residential Leith being a dumping ground for problems that no one else wants.