AN EDINBURGH local has laid bare the extent of the city’s many developments with an ingenious interactive Google Earth tool.
Harry Williams developed the useful tool in his spare time, which allows residents to navigate the Scottish capital with all the developments – both upcoming and ongoing – highlighted in orange.
The 24-year-old launched his tool yesterday, with the idea of allowing locals to more easily navigate and track the planning process in the city, noting that he found the maps created by the city council often difficult to find.
Heavily inspired by another project, Skyscraper City, which tracks Edinburgh’s developments in detail, Harry cross checked the information against the council’s planning portal.
The end result is a 3D model of the city within the Google Earth tool, with highlighted areas of proposals and ongoing developments clear to see for any interested locals.
The map shows the city awash with orange outlines of projects, including major works such as the regeneration of Meadowbank and the redevelopment of both the former Jenners building and the former Royal Hospital for Sick Children.
Harry, who is a portfolio administrator for Scots letting agents Rettie, is now aiming to update the tool further with the phases of each development broken down in detail for those browsing as well as including other cycling and walking projects by the council.
Speaking today Harry said: “I do think this could be a valuable asset to the residents of Edinburgh to get a better understanding of the planning process, what is underway in their local area and [to] participate in local politics.
“The whole map is based on a summary written up on a development forum called “Skyscraper City.
“It is created by a user called Kenspeckle and he has carried a lot of the leg work to create the foundations of this.
“My part in this has been to take this information, cross check it on the Edinburgh planning portal and map out the site-lines of each development then tag and create each individual development under its own folder.
“I have set it up in a flexible way that will allow me to add a lot more in the future, as I would like to add further aspects to this.
“You can see some of this in the ‘Shawfair’ development where I have broken down each phase and mapped these out individually.
“I would like to do this across most of the larger developments when I find time.
“Additionally, the council publishes the Active Travel Improvement plan every quarter. This includes local placemaking and walking, wheeling and cycling projects.
“These projects are also major developments that affect all of Edinburgh and I would like to further map out these too.
“There are a lot of maps produced by Edinburgh City Council already, but these can sometimes be buried deep within the agendas for council committee meetings.
“I would like to have one place that is accessible and readable for most people to look at these plans all at once.
“There is a 2030 city plan map, but it can be tricky to navigate and use.
“I don’t necessarily think Google Earth is the answer but something such as this could be quite helpful to further inform local people, in my own opinion.
“I don’t know of other cities within the UK that have council involvement in mapping at that level, but it would definitely be interesting to investigate.
“There are wonderful people on Skyscraper City, Twitter and Bluesky that do a great job at tracking individual major developments and keeping us up to date.”
