Local knowledge - Granton, Edinburgh

[Thrall]

All this talk of Granton Harbour in its heyday has brought back memories of my Final Project in my Open University course Cities & Technology (Babylon to Singapore). The subject was to do with Playfair’s radical design from Calton Hill down to Leith, and why it was only partly completed.
Part of my studies was based on the railway from Canal St (now Waverley) to Granton that utilized the Scotland St Tunnel. This tunnel was operational only from 1846 to 1868 (for passenger traffic). Through the tunnel, carriages and wagons were pulled up the incline by a stationary engine on cables. An alternate route to the East via Abbeyhill, Powderhall and then to Trinity which took the incline out of the equation.

Thank you Jamboesque for that info and the link.

For those who have not read "44 Scotland Street" by Alexander McCall Smith, either in The Scotsman or in paperback flesh, I can recommend it as a light Edinburgh read with the heroine crawling around in the the above tunnel with a failing torch. Perhaps not the most believable bit, but good entertainment.

BTW, sitting in the back row of the "Gods" at the Usher Hall last year with daughter, just having read "The Sunday Philosophy Club", also by AMS, gave a new meaning to acrophobia!........

Best wishes,

Thrall

[nigelbee]

I have a photograph of Starbank Park taken around 1891:

http://www.nigelbee.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/alexander.htm

[Bertha]

I pass the Old Chain Pier and Starbank weekly.
The pub went on fire a couple of years ago but has been fully restored and although I haven't been inside have heard it does a good meal.
I lived with my parents at my gran's in Wardie when I was wee and went to Starbank to roll my Easter Eggs just as my dad had as a boy living in Newhaven/Leith.
Thrall you were brave coming down that steep brae!
Bertha

[LesleyB]

Hi Nigel
Welcome to Talking Scot

Best wishes
Lesley

[marie]

Hi - I have a family living in Granto Cottages in 1861 and then Wardie Cottages in 1871. Are these the same cottages?
The family stayed around that area and were living in 7 Wardie Square in 1881 (tried to find it - but couldn't find a number 7 when I visited). Later census records have them living at 17 Wardie Square.


Marie

[Thrall]

I pass the Old Chain Pier and Starbank weekly.
The pub went on fire a couple of years ago but has been fully restored and although I haven't been inside have heard it does a good meal.
I lived with my parents at my gran's in Wardie when I was wee and went to Starbank to roll my Easter Eggs just as my dad had as a boy living in Newhaven/Leith.

Hi Bertha, and thank you for confirming that my family was not so "different" with its egg rolling at Easter!
Speaking to my brother today, and just for the record, he asserted that the Old Chain Pier was the first pub in Edinburgh with a colour television, I suppose in late 1969............

Nigel, thanks for the photo´; the park looks remarkably similar to when I did my Easter thing a while back.

Thrall

[AnneM]

Definitely a fan of the Old Chain Pier. Used to frequent on occasions in my student days with a friend who lived in Trinity and fairly recently was there for lunch with a herald of arms!!! Had a good chat about family history while our respective spouses glazed over in total boredom. Think that when I move back to Auld Reekie would quite like to live in Trinity, unless the houses get so dear I will only be able to afford a garden shed!

Anne

[Muriel]

The Old Chain Pier is famous for it's tripe - usually on at lunchtime only, if you like that kind of thing - and the Starbank for it's haddock mornay & it's ENORMOUS portions!

Muriel