Letter: Can we get tram project back on track?

Many people in Edinburgh and the Lothians are fed up with the tram impasse (your reports). However, I do feel some are confusing two clearly differing viewpoints. One is "anti-tram" no matter what; while the other tends to the more objective stance of "why has this project got into such a mess?" (coupled with a sense of despair).

When one looks abroad, things are different. France, for example, has built 22 tram systems in recent years with Reims being the latest addition. Meantime, many French cities are seeking to expand their networks thanks to public acclaim for tram travel. Bordeaux, for example, is about to add a further 34km of tracks. What separates us Scots from the French "can do" approach to tramway construction?

Meanwhile in Germany, the citizens of Dresden are to benefit from a further 14.9km of tramway for a total cost of only €223 million (198m).

Could it be that part of the problem in Edinburgh lies in the cost of moving or renewing public utilities beneath the road surface? Since many of the city's ageing gas, electricity, sewers and water mains need replacing anyhow, could this be the financial issue that really needs further discussion rather than tramway construction per se?

Please, can we just get on with completing, then possibly expanding, the Edinburgh system and stop whingeing, while taking care to contrast the variation in costing and financing British and continental modern tramway systems?

DAVID J WOOD

Back Station Road

Linlithgow

West Lothian

IT IS outrageous that the Scottish Liberal Democrats should complain about the money "wasted" on the Edinburgh trams project (your article, 30 April) when it is their party's city administration which is to blame for the catastrophe.

The Lib Dems on the City of Edinburgh Council have allowed the hugely-expensive Tie operation to remain in charge of the project despite having demonstrated long ago its abject inability to deliver it. It is the Lib Dems who have allowed Tie to blow the project's publicly-funded budget to such an extent that we are now unlikely to secure more than one-third of the original route network, with the Princes Street tram tracks remaining ignominiously isolated for the foreseeable future, and most of the fleet flogged off to one of the UK cities who know how to build and operate tram systems properly. Yet not a single head has rolled for this appalling failure. Whatever the outcome, it will be unavoidably humiliating for Edinburgh, and the Lib Dems should face up to their culpability.

ROBERT DRYSDALE

Primrose Bank Road

Trinity, Edinburgh

I'M ASTOUNDED by your suggestion that additional money for the capital's trams be "found" for something "half useful". (Perspective, 30 April). Such wasteful funding would have to be borrowed, ensuring that the financial burden on Edinburgh's citizens would increase: there is no prospect of profit.

How can you possibly justify the addition of a few more stops as elevating the farcical proposed Airport-Haymarket service to even "half useful"? I believe only one halt is allowed for in Princes Street: would the trams stop halfway along? How many cars could each line accommodate?

This council ego trip - initiated to allow Edinburgh "to compete with other cities" - was bungled from the initial contract stage, leaving the city already heading for the "international ignominy" you fear from abandonment.

On the contrary, the council would be entitled to congratulations for having the courage to admit failure - no disgrace, therefore - and refusing to throw good money after bad for the sake of saving face. It's too late for that.

ROBERT DOW

Ormiston Road

Tranent