Car park's closure sparks spaces fear

FEARS have been raised over a squeeze on parking in the city centre ahead of the closure of the 450-space site at Haymarket.

Developers are set to move into land at the former Morrison Street Goods Yard by the end of this year when work on a £200 million hotel and office complex gets under way.

A replacement underground car park is being built as part of the scheme, but this will not be ready until the spring of 2011.

Business groups today said the closure would put pressure on other premium city centre parking spaces and repeated calls for a 600-space facility on Morrison Street, using robots to park and retrieve vehicles, to be reopened, after it has been lying empty for four years.

Council chiefs today said there were ample parking opportunities elsewhere in the city centre, as well as the option of leaving the car at one of the city's park-and-ride sites.

Graham Bell, spokesman for Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, said: "The Haymarket site is a major parking area for the West End and financial district and it will be a big loss.

"While we are supportive of a sustainable travel policy to minimise congestion, we have to face facts that people still need to park in the city centre.

"Park-and-ride sites do help, but we still need decent provision of parking in the city centre if we are to compete with other major cities across the UK and Europe.

"The unused car park on Morrison Street would be one way out of this situation but there doesn't seem to be anyone moving this issue along."

The £5m Autosafe "Sky Park" idea, which allows cars to be "stacked" and takes up only half the space of a traditional multi-story, was opened to much fanfare in 2001. Just two years later, however, operator Sky Parks (Edinburgh) Ltd went into receivership.

Sky Parks' joint receiver KPMG has been holding talks with potential operators to reopen the site, but nothing has materialised yet.

John Nesbitt, managing director of Tiger Developments, which is redeveloping the Haymarket site, said: "The Haymarket will include the replacement of the current 450-space, open-air car park with a secure 450-space underground facility managed by a leading car park operator.

"The plans offer the opportunity to not only vastly improve the quality of public parking in the West End of the city centre but also significantly reduce car crime."

The Haymarket plan, which has still to win the approval of the Scottish Government, will see two new hotels alongside shops and offices built on the gap site.

It is hoped the buildings, which include a 17-storey, five-star hotel, will be in place by 2012.

Councillor Phil Wheeler, the city's transport leader, said: "The full provision of parking currently available at Morrison Street will be replaced by the developer of The Haymarket in due course. In the meantime, I would encourage drivers to think of alternative means of getting into the city."