Davidson’s Mains & Silverknowes Association www.dmsa.org.uk November NEWSLETTER 2019 A MESSAGE FROM THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS GROUP We are delighted to announce the Christmas Lights switch-on event will be from 5-7pm on Saturday 30 November at Holy Cross Church. We have a very special start planned for the event and we’d hate for you to miss it, so please come down as soon as you can. We’re selling tickets again this year; it’s £2.50 for adults and kids are free. We’re going to have a slight change of layout. To help protect the grass in the churchyard, we’ll be making more use of East Barnton Gardens and the space at the entrance to the park. As usual we’re keeping it local, so we’ll be selling the traditional food and drink favourites, with fun for the kids, entertainment from the stage, and a warm welcome with hot drinks and cake in the hall. DMains Tap – a special locally brewed ale - will be back, on draught and in bottles to take home. And new for this year, Sue’s Kitchen will be selling their delicious homemade Thai food. We’re really looking forward to seeing you all there, and making this a really special community event. We’ve had a busy year of fundraising and planning. Our recent bag pack in DMains Tesco raised over £400. Thank you to everyone who supported us. A big change for us is that we are now a constituted group, and so after a couple years of brilliant support and guidance from DMSA, we’ve become self-sufficient and are managing our own budget, but we’ll remain closely associated with them. We originally formed as a group in 2017 when Edinburgh City Council were unable to guarantee they would continue to provide Christmas street decorations. Our fundraising campaign was launched in order to secure the future of a Christmas lights display along Main Street. Thanks to the fantastic support of the community we met our £10K target this year, and were fortunate to receive another two years of the Council providing the lights. So you will see the Council lights are being used again this year. We’re continuing our fundraising to give us a sustainable plan for providing a really special local lights display and to make sure we can host our switch-on event every year. Although we’re now in a position where we don’t know whether the Council will provide lights in 2020, at least we can give you a guarantee that there will be a lights display in future years. And this year we are starting to use our funds to provide a number of new additional light displays to bring some extra sparkle to Main Street. We’d love to hear from you if you’ve got ideas for the future of the Christmas lights display or the switch-on event, and of course if you have any spare time, we always welcome new volunteers. We’ll be holding our AGM in March, and will post the details nearer the time. Please come along and say hello. You’ll find us online on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for news and updates on our fantastic sponsors and supporters. You can also send us an email at [email protected] or visit our new website www.dmainsxmaslights.com for details of when and where you can buy tickets for the switch-on event. But you will also be able to pay at the gate. Finally, huge thanks from all of us for the continued wonderful support from residents, businesses, Davidson’s Mains Primary School and the community organisations of Davidson’s Mains and Silverknowes. Together, let’s make DMains shine! The Christmas Lights Group HOW TO CONTACT THE DMSA We are always very interested in hearing from residents on local issues and welcome relevant comments that any resident cares to make. The best way to contact us is via our website, or contacting Charlotte or Rod by whichever method suits. We have been circulating members of the Association with email communications about important local issues which appears to have been welcomed. If you are not a member and would like access to our communications it is still possible to join the Association for the modest sum of only £2 per annum. New members would be very welcome. If you are interested or just want to support the work we do you can apply for membership by downloading the form through our website, completing the comment slip on the website or by contacting Charlotte directly. Contact details are as follows: Secretary, Charlotte Cowe, 151 Main Street, EH4 5AQ. Tel: 0131 336 2494 email: [email protected] Chair, Rod Alexander, Tel: 0131 336 3856 Via the website www.dmsa.org.uk PROPOSALS FOR A DEFIBRILLATOR IN THE VILLAGE Public awareness is increasing all the time about the benefits of having quick access to a Defibrillator after a cardiac arrest. Without any immediate response, survival rates are as low as only 1 in 20. However ,if a defibrillator can be used quickly within 3-5 minutes of collapse, survival rates increase dramatically to as much as 75%. These statistics provide overwhelming evidence of the case for having defibrillators readily available to the public. In Davidson’s Mains there are defibrillators available at a number of locations including Tesco, DM Dentist , Ye Olde Inn and Maitland Bowling Club and at the Parish Church where a new one has just been installed . This is a fair number but the only one which has external access and is available for 24 hours per day is the new one at the church. It is excellent for the church and the Quality Street end of the village but it is a bit remote from the village centre. The Association has for some time been interested in providing a defibrillator in a public location central to the village with 24 hour, 7 days a week access although we were always a bit concerned about the cost and had anticipated it would need a public appeal or contributions from local businesses. However towards the end of last year we were approached by a generous local resident who was willing to provide the necessary funds if a suitable location could be identified . At that stage we moved to have detailed discussions with St. John Scotland who run a Public Access Defibrillator Project and who provide advice on all aspects of installation, maintenance and training for the equipment. The scheme requires a hosting arrangement for the equipment and the Association would be very pleased to do this on behalf of the community. The situation now is very hopeful . As we go to print it looks like we have a possible location at the junction of Corbiehill Road and Main Street and we are seeking assurances on the availability of funds, so there is every chance of this worthwhile initiative going ahead very soon. We will provide a lot more information about the defibrillator, the location and the generous donor once everything is firmed up . ACTIVE TRAVEL AND SAFER ROUTES TO SCHOOL CAMPAIGN The Association has had discussions with a group from the Davidson’s Mains Primary School Parent Council to discuss the development of an Active Travel Plan for the school. The objectives will be to increase active travel with more walking and cycling to school with less parental car usage which has safety implications for pupils around the school entrance on Corbiehill Road and leads to very high levels of air pollution from car exhausts. The broad purpose will be to encourage a change in the behaviour of parents and children to move to active travel while seeking investment to improve safety. The DMSA recognises that this will be a plan owned by the Parent Council who are themselves best placed to engage with the parents and pupils on changing attitudes and behaviour with respect to the means of travel to school, but the Association, and Future DMS , are local groups can help to campaign and give support for the type of investment needed for dedicated safe routes to school, some aspects of which may require significant investment and will take time effort and commitment to try to ensure that Council funding can be made available. A good example is the route to school from Silverknowes which has over 35% of the school role. There is only one recognised route to school for most of these pupils who travel via the route over the bridge on Silverknowes Road, to the crossing on Main Street and then along Vivian Terrace to the school on Corbiehill Road. Nearly all the children from Silverknowes use this route and either walk, scoot or cycle to the school. There is clearly a very strong case for designating this as a protected walking and cycle route from the junction with Silverknowes East to the school entrance. A school survey highlighted the fact that parents and children view the crossing on Main Street as high risk and Future DMS have developed a design to take this forward. This is something which is mentioned elsewhere in our Newsletter. When the children and parents reach Corbiehill Road they encounter the risks from the parking problems at the school and the pollution from the exhausts. There are other clear primary routes to school for which plans are needed but this gives an example of the sort of direction which is needed with a number of strands of action each feeding in to a common purpose.