Transport for All

Edinburgh needs a first class Public Transport System providing choice, convenience and flexibility. Rail-based public transport needs to be developed to augment Edinburgh's extensive bus network. We must have comprehensive and affordable public transport links between all areas of the region, linking major traffic-generating facilities (for example, hospitals, educational centres) and areas of employment opportunities.

Transform the public transport experience

• Build on the success of the Greenways and extend bus priority to all major corridors.
  
  
• Provide information on all transport, for residents and visitors, at an accessible "one stop shop" in the city centre.
  
  
• Install high-profile street maps of the available public transport network - at bus stops and key interchanges.
  
  
• Introduce an attractive zonal travel card that allows use of all public transport modes with one ticket, and rewards regular users with discounted fares.

• Put in place a programme to ensure the implementation of "bus boarders" (elevated pavement edges) at all bus stops - combined with stronger discouragement of illegal parking.
  
  
• Ensure that all public transport vehicles are physically accessible for all members of the community.
  
  
• Support demand-responsive transport and community transport schemes where they are needed, especially for disabled and older people.

• Build a tram network, closely integrated with the bus network, serving the city's busiest transport corridors. Trams are a key component of the best transport networks around the world, combining the frequent stops and on-street accessibility of buses with the speed of train travel.
  
  
• Ensure high-quality interchanges between tram lines and rail, coach, bus and cycle networks.

• Redevelop Waverley and Haymarket stations as the key regional transport interchanges.
  
  
• Deliver a high-speed, limited stop rail service to Glasgow and the West of Scotland via the under-utilised Shotts Line.
  
  
• Deliver rail sevices on the South Suburban Railway, providing an orbital route in the south of the city.

• Press the Scottish Executive to fund the construction of the Waverley Route to the Borders, putting BritainÕs largest area without rail back onto the railway map.
  
  
• Provide capacity on the East Coast Main Line to allow a stopping rail service serving the East Lothian and Berwickshire towns currently overreliant on car commuting.
  
  
• Create a regional freight interchange at Millerhill, allowing more heavy lorry loads to be transferred to rail, and to smaller road vehicles for urban delivery.