I have a confession to make. It may make you change your already skewed impression of me, but I’m done with hiding my secret. I'm excited about the trams.
There, I said it. Now I can relax.
OK, excited is maybe too strong a word, but I don't hate the idea of a tram and I don't hate the idea of using one. I’m aware of the money that has been spent on them and the disruption preparing for them has caused to businesses and this city as a whole, but come Saturday, I will be boarding a tram and I intend to enjoy the experience and regularly use it.
Am I trying to be controversial? Well yes, I am.
But to be quite honest, I’m sick of all the pointless negativity. I’m quite happy to have a discussion and to hear the arguments, but it has to be constructive. Once the start date was announced, the Edinburgh Evening News released this headline: ‘Tram shares launch date with Titanic’. How do people born on 31 May carry on with their lives knowing that they could face the same fate as a passenger liner?
Obviously, the ghosts of that ill-fated disaster will have as much effect on our public transport as would Death if the trams were launched on Friday the 13th.
It’s all too easy to jump on the bandwagon and bemoan the trams and attack them from every angle. The trams are here to stay and if we don’t use them they will just turn into an even bigger waste of money.
Whenever I’m in a taxi, I always make a point of asking the driver why the roads are being dug up, just so I can hear a good old-fashioned rant. During the Festival, I’ve enjoyed hearing the tram-related jokes from the Fringe’s finest. But what will happen when the trams run without a hitch? What will the taxi drivers rant about then? What will the Edinburgh Evening News write about?
Why not give the trams some room to breathe and let them run for a while before we start dragging them down? It’s time that this city was no longer the joke; it’s time for the trams to run and to run on time. You never know: they might even become a success.
So what will we all complain about next? I for one have plenty to get off my chest. Did you hear they might be taking the trams down to Leith? What an enormous …
Do you suffer from occasional bouts of optimism? Write and tell us about it by email: spurtle@hotmail.co.uk or Twitter: @theSpurtle or Facebook: Broughton Spurtle
[Image of Titanic: Creative Commons/gmeador]
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Outlook sunny, clouds possible later: http://www.broughtonspurtle.org.uk/news/outlook-sunny-clouds-possible-later … #brightside #trams
@theSpurtle Indeed. I'm certainly excited about not taking the tram to the Gyle Centre on Saturday.
@NewTownFlaneur Don't fixate on the Gyle Centre. Widen your horizons and don't go anywhere else either. Not travelling broadens the bind.
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LHTD, Update 31 May: Well, the big day finally arrived and it didn’t disappoint, but it didn’t overwhelm us either. Which is a good thing really – who wants to be overwhelmed or disappointed by a mode of transport?
The Little Left-Handed Tea Drinker and I boarded a tram at York Place and travelled out into the wide world. The roads were quiet at 7.30am (we weren’t eager, we’d been awake since 6am), and we were impressed by the smoothness of the journey and the friendliness of the staff. The little LHTD was asleep for the outbound journey and woke up as we arrived at Haymarket. We decided against an #ontramselfie as the back of the ticket suggests, but we remembered that very important warning on the sign at York Place #carefulnow. I still don’t have a clue what it means. Why they couldn’t put up a traditional warning/caution sign, I don’t know.
We got off, looked around and discovered that there’s a whole new world out there waiting to be explored. But the little LTHD decided today wasn’t the day for it, so we jumped onto the next tram and returned home. You can take the baby out of Broughton but she’s really not that bothered. The Edinburgh Trams are here and I’m ready to move on. Where shall we explore next? #neverleavingbroughtonagain
