North Queensferry Community Council

The following is an extract from an email from Transport Scotland (the client for the Queensferry Crossing/holder of the purse strings) with regard to Community Benefit attributed to the Queensferry Crossing construction contracts:

“I note the further comments from your Community Council relating to a perceived lack of community benefits for North Queensferry specifically. In my e-mail response to you of 19 April 2016 I focussed on the contractual obligations which were placed on the Contractor and also noted the progress that has been made on the relocation of the Beamer Rock lighthouse through engagement with the North Queensferry Heritage Trust. If, as you say, there is disagreement within the community as to where the lighthouse should be relocated then this needs to be resolved in the near future as the component parts will have to be removed from their current storage in the site compound at King Malcolm Drive during 2017. I can confirm that the offer of transport will continue to be valid if an alternative site within the village is identified which is accessible to road transport.

 

You have requested specific information on the “extra efforts or non-tangible benefits” which the project has provided and I am pleased to provide you with the following specific examples of donations, work “in kind” and considerations from the project for a wide range of communities on the north side of the Forth.

 

• Benefitting organisations include, but are not limited to, Fife Coast and Countryside Trust, Park PS (Rosyth), St Serf’s PS (Torryburn), Cairneyhill YFC, Building Blocks Nursery (Rosyth), NQ Gala, Head teachers (Inverkeithing, N Queensferry, Rosyth - visit and buffet at the Project Office).
• Visits to primary schools in NQ, Inverkeithing, Rosyth, Dalgety Bay, Valleyfield, Torryburn, Aberdour and Kirkcaldy.
• Bike purchase for Road Safety prize, painting competition, veterans’ visits, changing rooms container for sports club, NQ Children’s Bridge Race sponsorship, donation to refurbishing playpark (Crombie), provision of water bottles, bugs, pens, sharpeners for visiting schools or schools visited, Inverkeithing Big Band donation, tidy up NQPS playground and installation of storage facility, minibus and bus trip various donations, secure garden shed gift to Rosyth initiative.
• In addition the project has hosted numerous visits to all of these schools and more from Fife, to the Contact and Education Centre
• An initiative which was introduced at the start of the project namely, the Monitor Host Good Cause Initiative, has proved very popular with the people who agreed at the outset to allow us to site our noise, vibration and air quality monitoring equipment in their gardens. We invite each one of them to nominate a good cause, annually, to be the recipient of £500, financed by FCBC. To date, organisations which have benefitted from monitor hosts north of the Forth  have included North Queensferry Primary School, North Queensferry Heritage Trust, Hillfield Swifts Junior Football club and Scotsguards’ Colonel’s Fund.
• Recently FCBC have hosted a visit of representatives from West Bay Users Group (North Queensferry) to our marine yard where we store materials which are no longer required on this project (but may be required elsewhere – yet to be determined). The visit established that there are items which are of interest to the West Bay  group and FCBC have agreed to re-visit the yard once we have the new crossing open to traffic with a view to deciding what, if anything, could be made available to the Group.
• Recent awards of cash to:-  NQPS – Centenary Celebration Wall Tiles - £2500; Crossing the Black Water – Fife Council initiative involving 9 Fife Primary Schools  incl NQPS – engineering workshops and model building - £2625; Chicken Run – Queen Anne High School - design and build of egg handling machine - £1990; Building Bridges – Children’s Theatre Group, drama/dance involving children from north and south of the Forth to be performed to audiences around  the time of the Queensferry Crossing opening.

 

It is also worth mentioning that we have made it clear at the Community Forums that we welcome approaches for sponsorship to educational initiatives. In all cases where people have approached us to seek sponsorship/donations, we have tried our best to help them. Generally, their requests have been accommodated to some degree and we have received lots of positive feedback from recipients.

 

I am sure that NQCC may not have been aware of all the initiatives noted above, but as you will see these are very wide ranging and are in the spirit of delivering the wider benefits to communities which the project always aimed to provide.

 

Regards”

 

NB: Names and contact details have been removed for Data Protection.  Residents of North Queensferry wishing to comment may do so via www.nqcc.co.uk or via Members of the Community Council.