Mourning and Modernity: Reflections on Edinburgh’s Changing Face

Charlie Ellis on the gentrification of Edinburgh.

The No. 13 

Encouraged to show someone a ‘different slice of the city’, the most fitting approach was to hop onto the enigmatic No. 13 bus. Not part of the main Lothian Buses network, the bus offers access to areas of Edinburgh that are otherwise difficult to reach; the parts rarely included on a visitor’s itinerary. In truth, in Edinburgh, it takes an effort to find ‘liminal’ areas. 

We boarded in the ordered elegance of the New Town, soon swooping past the ultra-trendy ‘coffee spot’, Cafēn, plunging down toward Canonmills and Broughton, before launching up Macdonald Road. This street encapsulates so many interesting aspects of the city, particularly the creative re-use of old buildings. The area’s streets bear the indelible imprint of what was here before, yet they also manifest significant change. The transformation of the Shrubhill Tram Depot for instance (now expensive flats), perfectly typifies this urban shift.

The Dynamics of Change: Edinburgh vs. London

This aspect of urban change, and a constant comparison with London, would dominate our trip. Edinburgh, after London, is the most visited city in the country, and one that countless people aspire to live in. The core question looms: is this demand changing the city beyond recognition, or is it bringing new life and energy, regenerating areas too long ignored? For decades, some parts of the city have been implicitly kept out of mind, perhaps for fear they might conflict with Edinburgh’s carefully curated self-image of rich history and neo-classical architectural splendour. Such ‘liminal’ areas are increasingly hard to find. 

My companion’s own experience provided a powerful lens for comparison. He spent much of the 1980s in London, working as a graphic designer and enjoying parts of East London like; Dalston, Limehouse, and the burgeoning Canary Wharf. He subsequently fell out of love with the city as those more interesting areas were thoroughly gentrified and sanitised.

Restalrig: The Edinburgh Nobody Knows

Eventually, the No. 13 deposited us in the deeply residential, deeply unremarkable Restalrig; an example of the ‘Edinburgh Nobody Knows’. This, like comparable areas including Stenhouse, is an area where thousands of locals live but which virtually none would consider a destination. For the No. 13 bus, however, it is a destination, marking its point of termination.

From there, we dropped onto the Restalrig Railway Path. Protected by deep cuttings and surrounded by trees and thick vegetation, you are momentarily disconnected from urban life, back in a bucolic, ‘villagey’ Edinburgh. This ‘active travel’ corridor is largely devoid of urban life until you round the bend, following the boundary of Seafield Cemetery and Crematorium.

Seafield: Where Stink Meets Sourdough

As we began to turn westward, we found ourselves looking over Seafield, an area long disparaged but now on the cusp of a major transformation. The Seafield Masterplan promises ‘transforming the north-east Edinburgh area of Seafield into a new climate resilient coastal neighbourhood.’ For decades, Seafield has been home to things the city would rather not acknowledge: factories, the Waste Water Treatment Works – and the crematorium itself. It was decidedly not considered a desirable place to live. That is rapidly changing.

Looking towards the Firth of Forth, our eyes alighted on a massive pile of bricks—the evidence of a recent demolition. This plot will soon be developed. More tellingly, lodged in the Leith end of Seafield, I recently happened upon a posh bakery (think cardamom buns, sourdough, and specialty coffee). That, I felt, was a sure sign that the area is in the midst of change. Gentrification hangs heavy over Seafield, competing with the lingering ‘Seafield stink.’

The Links and the Legacy of Leith

Moving onto the Links, we passed the Leith Franklin cricket pavilion, a venerable survivor (the club was founded in 1952). Besides its sporting use, it’s become a music venue; an example of how such places must find new uses to survive. Cutting past the well-maintained bowling green (a contrast to the abandoned Council greens at the western tip of the Links), we found the clearest manifestation of what the area is becoming.

Two developments, The Ropeworks and The Wireworks, constitute a nod to the area’s industrial past, but also represent radical change. The development here is, as one local put it, “all recent, all post-Covid.” Instead of dirty and dusty places of work, here we find ordered modern housing, dominated by the current fashion for dark brick. My sense is that this style will weather better than the cream-covered flats built in the 1990s and early 2000s, which are already turning green and gray as Edinburgh’s damp climate bites.

Other nods to the past include an effort to produce a modern version of the city’s traditional colony-style housing alongside the large apartment blocks, presumably for ‘young families.’ These design references are combined with the physical retention of elements like one of the large factory chimneys, a battered remnant (“it looks like someone’s backed into in a van”). 

Echoes of King’s Cross

Again, comparisons with London spring to mind, most notably the redevelopment immediately north of King’s Cross station. There, a seedy, post-industrial zone has transformed from a derelict area to a ‘vibrant area’ with new streets, homes, and public spaces,  and huge office blocks (for the likes of Google).  Coal Drops and Granary Square nod to what was here before. The Regent’s Canal, long a dismal backwater, is now the centrepiece, while repurposed industrial buildings – including the old gasholders, which now contain luxury flats – define the landscape.

Parallels here are with the restoration of the Granton Gasholder, a centrepiece of a wider transformation in another of Edinburgh’s ‘marginal’ zones. In Granton, many old buildings are being repurposed, including the gasworks railway station, now home to artists’ studios. As usual, artists and baristas are on the forefront of urban change.

Before Seafield becomes something hard to tally with its late twentieth-century character, it should be visited and recorded. What emerges over the next decade will no doubt be more liveable, the noise, traffic and pollution much reduced. But it’s natural, like those who visit the Crematorium nearby, to mourn  and ‘obituarise’ what has passed.

The impulse to hold on and resist the rational, the inevitable often speaks to a preservation of the soul. This instinct found a stark manifestation on Constitution Street, where we stood before an unusually dark building. The blackened, sooted stone of its façade was a testament to time, a character intensely protected by its elderly owner, a longtime Leither. She rejected the modern compulsion for laser-stripping, feeling that a sanitized surface would obliterate the structure’s authentic narrative along with its grime. This resistance is rooted in a deeper resignation: the fear that when she is gone, the cherished, meaningful contents of her life will be scattered into local charity shops, destined to be upcycled by those who may covet the items’ style but remain blind to the story, the heritage, they contain.

A City in Flux

Edinburgh’s changing face, as viewed from the winding route of the No. 13 bus, is a source of mixed feelings. The journey reveals an undeniable shift, marked by the transformation of industrial relics into expensive flats and the arrival of chic bakeries in previously ‘unfashionable’ locales like Seafield. This modernisation promises nicer, more liveable neighbourhoods, bringing new energy and investment to long-ignored corners of the city.

Yet, this progress is shadowed by a palpable sense of loss. The inevitable march of gentrification erases the scruffier, more interesting character that once defined places like East London in the 80s, a process now playing out in Edinburgh. We should acknowledge the natural instinct to mourn the passing of the old, the gritty, and the unremarkable, even as the city embraces its new future. The tension between celebrating regeneration and lamenting the erosion of the city’s complex, layered past lies at the heart of modern urban change.