Trams reaction: Not again, say West End traders at threat to business

A COMMON refrain from small businesses canvassed by The Scotsman yesterday was that not one of their customers had ever spoken up in favour of the tram scheme.

Many traders do not seem bothered about whether the council agrees to build to Haymarket or St Andrew Square, such is the level of antipathy towards a project that some believe is responsible for driving a number of businesses to the wall.

In the upmarket shopping streets off Shandwick Place, retailers fear the impact that a fresh round of tramworks would have on shops already suffering the effects of the economic slump.

Doreen Kerr, who owns fashion boutique The Cupboard in Stafford Street, says: “I just feel like closing the door. The work on Shandwick Place is just going to be so disruptive, I don’t know what we’re going to do.

“I’m just scared about the future, I can’t even bring myself to watch the news when there’s something happening with the trams.”

Liggy Morgan, 26, who runs Liggy’s Cake Company in William Street, opened two years ago and has known nothing but disruption caused by the trams.

She says the number of empty shops is a worry, leaving Queensferry Street in particular looking like a “total dump”.

Charles Guest, a partner at Ryden, says both Shandwick Place and Queensferry Street have been hit hard. “I think Shandwick Place was pretty badly affected, people were put off walking along it because it was basically a big building site.

“There’s no doubt the decision to stop the tram at Haymarket would be a complete disaster – it’s absolute madness. If it goes along Princes Street it will benefit shops, and I think Shandwick Place will recover eventually.”

Linda Forrester, who runs the William Street Food Company, perhaps has more reason than most to be negative about trams.

She lost her father, a taxi driver, when he was involved in an accident caused by works to remove Edinburgh’s last tram system to make way for buses in the 1950s.

She says: “If the trams were running to Leith and back that would be one thing, but what’s the point of having them just go to Haymarket or into the city centre? That’s not going to take buses off the streets.”

In Shandwick Place, restaurateur Tony Pia reckons the worst of the tramworks in 2008 cost him £10,000 a week in lost takings.

“There’s still a problem,” he says. “People don’t know if the road’s being dug up or not, so they just avoid this end of town.”

Asked whether he would rather see the tram go to Haymarket or into the city centre, he adds: “They should just forget it and put everything back to normal.”

Next door in Au Bar, manager Stuart Orr reminisces about his former pub, The Caledonian Ale House, which was demolished in 2008 to make way for the trams, despite being a favourite watering hole for 146 years.

“When Shandwick Place was closed the last time, businesses really struggled,” he says. “We rely on passing trade, and there was none at all.”

Back in William Street, Christine Cooper has owned The Extra Inch clothes shop for the past 37 years. She says: “The impact of the tramworks on this area in 2008 hit everyone like a sledgehammer. To make us go through that again would just be cruel.”