Delivering a World Class Tram System in Edinburgh's World Heritage Site: The Challenge of Integrating Urban Planning and Engineering Impacts

摘要

Modern trams are a "green" alternative for enhancing transportation systems in the future to meet the demands of our growing urban areas. There are several technical challenges in implementing a new tram system into any existing city. In the case of Scotland's Capital City of Edinburgh, it is not only meeting the technical challenges of providing a tram system for the city, but designing sensitively in a UNESCO World Heritage Site and minimising impacts to historic streets and buildings. The Edinburgh Trams project has proven to be a unique challenge of balancing the technical and urban planning requirements, while not only maintaining, but, in coordination with other local projects, enhancing both the urban setting and transportation system. This paper presents the design development of St. Andrew Square, a key urban space within the World Heritage Site. It will describe and evaluate the innovative working arrangements, tools and processes which have delivered the design for modern trams in Edinburgh. We will highlight how to balance the technical requirements and geometric constraints with the challenges for place-making, complying with urban planning requirements, integrating with the wider transportation network, and minimising the aesthetic impacts through this highly important and visible space at the heart of the World Heritage Site. We have achieved great success in working with the City of Edinburgh Council, heritage organisations and other third party stakeholders to achieve a sympathetic and robust overall design solution for the City and its citizens. The integrated design has been able to overcome various urban planning and design challenges to meet the fine balance of requirements to achieve a viable re-introduction of trams to Edinburgh. Further work is required to ensure that the detail required is met during the construction and that the principles established during the design development are carried forward with future works.