PAIN BEFORE GAIN: THE EDINBURGH TRAMS

SquareOne News Feature

by Chris Hammond

With the furore over the Edinburgh trams getting increasingly heated SquareOne caught up with a tram travelling expat Scot living in the Polish City of Wroclaw for his opinion.

Gregor Gowans is a part time music journalist and English teacher who has been living in Poland for nine months now. He knows Scotland like the back of his hand and is in a perfect position to comment on the advantages and disadvantages of the tram system in one of the biggest cities in central Europe. Does he, like so many people in Edinburgh agree that the trams are going to be detrimental in the long and short term?

“Well I know what Edinburgh is like, the traffic is hellish. It’s a really congested city and I can’t think anyone would really fancy driving around there. Thing is though Wroclaw is a much bigger city and just as busy but you just don’t get the same sort of problems over here and yeah that could well be down to the efficiency of the trams. They are cheap, clean and fast. I use them whenever I can.”

Gregor tells SquareOne the trams vary in age and are still dependant on the flow of traffic for making it to their stops on time. But he also thinks their status as environmentally friendly could work in their favour over here.

“There aren’t actually many routes the trams take but the ones they do use are much better than the buses. To be honest the other thing about them is that they are seen as environmentally friendly and as a real student city people seem to like this. I mean Edinburgh is pretty polluted right? You hardly see a bird in some parts of town. Wroclaw isn’t great either but trams are better than anything else in that respect”.

So without being in Edinburgh right now can Gregor appreciate the problems that are being caused by the introduction of the trams and does he think that the ends will justify the means?

“You know what it’s a little pain for a lot of gain. Petrol is going up in price and this is the time for other kinds of transportation. If a city can get away with it now then why not do it? Sure the commotion will cause problems and I don’t expect that the work will be quick but it’ll be worth it”.

Photo by Katie Lips