UN comes to aid of Shandwick Place

RESIDENTS campaigning for the reopening of Shandwick Place are celebrating after a United Nations committee ruled the city council was wrong to withhold data about traffic pollution at the West End.

The Moray Feu residents association claim heavier traffic displaced from Shandwick Place has increased pollution in residential streets and the data will help show the impact which trams will have across the city. Ashley Lloyd, one of the campaigners, said: “The council was routinely giving us figures on a month-by-month basis and we were able to show an alarming increase in pollution, then they said they would only give us the data more than a year later.”

The group took their case to a UN committee. Mr Lloyd said: “This is a major meeting in Geneva with lawyers from around the world and we were able to make our case, which was sufficiently compelling for lawyers from many countries to vote in support of us.”

The residents made other complaints on which the committee said it could not come down on one side or the other.

Council transport convener Lesley Hinds said: “We note the committee’s recommendation about the release of data and will take this on board.

“I will continue to engage with Moray Feu representatives and to address their concerns.”