New 1,000ft gateway to Royal Highland Show gets go-ahead

WORK to transform the home of Scotland’s biggest agricultural showpiece will start later this year after permission was granted for the first phase of the £30 million project.

Planning permission has been granted for the first sections of a tree-lined boulevard that will lead up to a new entrance at the transformed home of the Royal Highland Centre, near Edinburgh Airport.

A 20-year masterplan to transform the site into a world class venue was given the green light by Edinburgh City Council in April last year.

However, now the first specific part of the project has been approved by the local authority.

The boulevard, leading off Eastfield Road – the main access road to the airport – will be 290 metres (950ft) long and more than 30 metres wide, edged by footpaths and tree avenues.

The Royal Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland (RHASS), behind the project, said it will allow for the “mass movement of vehicles and pedestrians along an impressive access” to the east side of the new centre.

The boulevard will be the “spine” of the revamped centre, which will include a 165-bedroom hotel. RHASS chief executive Stephen Hutt said work was likely to begin following this year’s Royal Highland Show in June.

“There have been some issues of detail to be discussed with the planners, but these have now been resolved and we look forward to making a start on construction,” he said.

“The boulevard will be a main artery serving the Royal Highland Centre and its completion is pivotal to the other developments envisaged for the east of the showground. It is heartening that we can now start to progress the plans to transform our grounds into a world class exhibition and event venue.”

The initial work will be just for part of the boulevard, due to some business tenants being on the land needed to complete the new access road.

However, RHASS anticipates the remainder of the boulevard will be approved in the future.

Plans for the eastern approaches to the new Royal Highland Centre also include a Scottish Centre of Excellence, an ‘agri-business’ hub, conference and leisure facilities. Last year, the RHASS said they hoped to have the hotel completed in 2012, but a spokesman said the timings had now been pushed back.

The Royal Highland Show is held over four days every June, generating about £75m for the economy. The event, which dates back to 1822, has been based at its current home in Ingliston since 1960.

The site’s future was thrown into doubt ten years ago over fears that Edinburgh Airport would need part of the existing site for its own expansion plans.

However, after the society spent several years drawing up plans to relocate to an alternative site, airport owner BAA said it would actually not need the land for at least another 20 years.