The Council has issued a “Call for ideas’ to inform the development of City Plan 2040, which will likely be finalised by 2028. This is an opportunity to submit suggestions relating to the future of the Astley Ainslie site. Edinburgh City Plan 2030 requires the development of Astley Ainslie to be “housing-led” and there to be 500 homes on the site. We have an opportunity to suggest modifying this as a response to the Call for ideas.

The Trustees will submit ideas on behalf of AACT, but individuals responding will add weight. Submissions could suggest revising the expected number of homes down to account for the retention of part of the site by NHS Lothian. The second major point could be to call for a change in the overall goal of developments to indicate that the natural environment of the Astley Ainslie site is a very valuable resource and therefore any building developments should be linked to conservation and improvement of the natural environment.

If you want to make a submission to the “Call for ideas”, please CLICK THIS LINK. There is an online form and, helpfully, at the bottom of the page, a PDF version of the form. There are two topics on the form: (1) Planning policy ideas (2) ideas about a building, space, site or something the city needs. For each of these, you can submit 5 ideas. You can start the form and save as you complete it, so you do not need to fill it in at one go. The deadline for submissions is September 30th 2026.