The 'filthy gold mine' which could be Edinburgh's crown jewel

The Royal Mile and its struggles as it buzzes with tourists

“It’s a beautiful street, isn’t it? Just imagine what it would be like if you could walk up and down without the traffic and the rubbish and the obstacle course from all the clutter on the street.”

It is Easter weekend, the sun is shining and the Royal Mile is buzzing with tourists. There is an endless stream of visitors stopping to take pictures on the High Street, as it heads uphill towards St Giles Cathedral and the statue of the great Enlightenment thinker Adam Smith.  

With the sun striking the upper floors of the tenements and St Giles’ crown-shaped spire looming into view, there is an undeniable beauty here. If you block out for a minute the Starbucks and Bella Italia, it is easy to imagine how little the basic streetscape has changed since Medieval times. The tall, thin-windowed buildings - the world’s first skyscrapers - interspersed with a series of intriguing entrances to dimly-lit closes. 

It’s highly atmospheric, but sometimes there is a lot to see beyond to appreciate it. At its worst, the Mile can be pretty ugly: the narrow, crowded pavements; the litter and occasional graffiti giving an appearance of grime; the ubiquitous tartan gift shops spilling out onto the street; the melee of barriers, signs and ugly street furniture.

‘Beautiful and filthy’

“We've got fantastic assets, but it just looks tatty,” says Lynzi Leroy.

We are standing outside the historic Tron Kirk where her social enterprise company the Scottish Design Exchange operates a highly popular craft market, alongside similar venues in George Street and Glasgow.

The Scottish Design Exchange inside the beautiful Tron Kirk

She is a great enthusiast for the Royal Mile - “It really is beautiful” - but it is driving her to distraction. Stepping out of the Tron you are met with a mess of multiple street signs, some litter despite the rows of trade waste bins, untended-looking street planters, and a redundant pedestrian crossing that still flashes and beeps every few minutes. That’s before you reach the perhaps essential, but unnecessarily ugly anti-terrorist barriers.

The proliferation of road signs on the corner of the Royal Mile and the Bridges

“Why do we need all these signs? There’s only one lane of traffic closed. People aren’t stupid. Why can’t we just get rid of a lot of this clutter? It feels like we are on a building site even though there is no work going on.”

The main issue that she sees though is the losing fight to keep the streets clean.

“It is just filthy. It all starts with the cleanliness because people don't start taking pride in the city until it is clean. My husband is French and when we go to visit his family in France I can't believe how clean it is, you won’t even find a cigarette butt on the ground. You don't notice how dirty Edinburgh is until you go there.”

She is keen to replicate the kind of system that works in the parts of southern France she visits where the businesses do a large part of the street cleaning themselves.