Searching for a bridge I was vaguely aware of, I found myself standing on it without knowing; my judgement clouded by the dense aluminium fencing that engulfs it. Only by peering through the razor sharp slits could I spy the gurgling water below. This slightly mysterious ex-railway bridge that sits over the Water of Leith, connecting Powderhall with St. Marks Park, a nodal point in North Edinburgh’s path network.

As I neared the security fence separating the southern end of the bridge from the construction site at Powderhall, a gaggle of youngsters were enjoying the sunshine. Sitting listlessly, they smoked something organic and pungent. Concerned that I might get passively high, I made my way back.

Dense with paths

After a buffer zone, the path narrows appreciably. Above you to the left sits the Craigroyston football ground; below you to the right lie a group of well sheltered allotments. Within a few yards you are back on the mainstream path network, with the crescent curved Chancelot Path extending in front of you. As you look back it is notable that the rough section of path towards Powderhall has no signage. Exploring it is not promoted, not encouraged.

I’ve often reconnoitred around here but after each visit, I feel the need to examine it again on a map. It’s not easy to make sense of. The area is dense with paths and routes, only some of which are well used.

The disused and neglected also offer radical potential, streaming into the future. Degeneration and regeneration running on parallel lines. Edinburgh is already blessed with many great routes for ‘active travel’ but also has several potential paths as yet unrealized. The idea of developing this disused railway line at Powderhall into an ‘active travel corridor’ has been mooted and feasibility studies published. Where would it take us?

A wasteland waits

It would take us eastward to Abbeyhill and Meadowbank. The back of Meadowbank Stadium is, these days, rather an unprepossessing place. Scruffiness abounds and wasteland waits to be transformed. Looking over the fence to overgrown terracing it’s hard to imagine that this place was packed with cheering crowds in both 1970 and 1986, for the Commonwealth Games. Near the back of Meadowbank, on Marionville Road, there is a glimpse of the potential path. On a cold winter’s day, the abandoned line looked bleak and forlorn, with trees shorn of colour encroaching the line.

Jungle

Closing my eyes, I imagine myself trundling along it, looking up at newly built brick flats as the path makes its way west towards Easter Road. To get there it passes under Crawford Bridge, also known as the ‘bridge of doom’, synonymous with football violence in the 1980s and 1990s. Stories abound of ‘casuals’ forced to jump from the bridge into the overgrown ravine below.

At Easter Road, this green corridor is engulfed in vegetation, with bushes and juvenile trees assertively sprouting up among the rails. At present, it would require a determined troupe macheting their way through the thicket. The potential path would then run under Leith Walk, beneath where the Police Box sits. Peering over the edge you can see the line heading inexorably towards the chimney of Shrubhill Power Station, itself part of another lost transport system, the cable-tram system.

Leith Water

The final leg of the journey would take you past the fast changing Shrubhill area, towards Powderhall, its final rusting rails lie in the undergrowth surrounding St Mark’s Park. Leafing through a yellowing copy of An Illustrated History of Edinburgh Railways, I find a photo and description of the old Powderhall Station and the way ‘the track dips down to a bridge over the Leith Water, to rise thence past the woodland of St. Marks Park, where the lines to Bonnington and North Leith diverged’. I love the old fashioned ‘thence’ and also the description of the river as ‘Leith Water’; they transport the reader back in time.

Action Plan 2030

When I first stepped into this hidden nook in St Mark’s Park, I thought the line might still be active; it was so well preserved under the canopy of trees. Indeed, it was only in 2017 that the line was placed, by Network Rail as being ‘temporarily out of use’, usually the first in a series of official steps to formally close a stretch of railway. According to railway expert Andrew Boyd, the section near Meadowbank may be retained to relieve the main line out of Edinburgh, but the abandoned branch to Powderhall is unlikely to be used again. So a path seems a no-brainer.

If this dream comes true, it will add another key piece to the lattice work of paths on the north of the city. Edinburgh Council’s Active Travel Action Plan 2030 lists this a ‘new path along former rail line from Lochend Park area to St Mark’s Park’ as a scheme that might be ‘delivered post 2026’.

Will the past be the future? We shall see. ■

Charlie Ellis, the author thanks members of the SICK Writing Group for their helpful comments on this piece