Our AGM will be held online on Wednesday, 8th October 2025 at 7:30pm on Zoom.
The meeting should last about an hour.
If you would like to attend, please email friendsofroseburnmembership@gmail.com and you will be sent the link for the meeting.
FoRP members have been emailed with an invitation. If you are not a member, please join for free at Join for Free!
You can see the papers for the meeting at http://friendsofroseburnpark.org.uk/files/2025/09/Friends_of_Roseburn_Park_AGM_2025_papers.pdf
The cafe will now be open on Tuesdays, meaning that the only day of the week it is closed will be Monday
Roseburn Park has been awarded FiT (Fields in Trust) status. This means the park is protected against developers and stops new buildings on this public land. The Friends of Roseburn Park (FoRP) first sought this status in 2017, but at that time we could not get sufficient Council support to proceed with our bid. With the conversion of the new cafe from the old toilet block and other local improvements, the park has become one the City of Edinburgh Council now agrees need protecting and so they have now approved our request. FiT status already applies to many Edinburgh parks; its protection is built around a legal agreement between the organisation Field in Trust and local authorities that ensures land so marked is protected in perpetuity.
To help mark the centenary of Fields in Trust, Roseburn Park has been selected as an example of a successful community park and one which FiT would like to commemorate. On Saturday 5th April 2025, the plaque (located under the Jubilee plaque at the cafe), was unveiled by the Lord Provost (Cllr Aldridge), the Chairperson of FiT (Ewan Gillies) and the Chairperson of FoRP (Jim McDonagh).
The help celebrate the event, there were activities in the park that day as follows:
11.30 Murrayfield Wanderers Ladies Team vs Livingston Ladies – No 2 pitch in west park
13.00 Murrayfield Wanderers Girls Practice Session- West section of park
13:00 Murrayfield DAFS AllStars/Dynamos practise – junior section on grass oval
14.45 Plaque Unveiling – Lord Provost, Chair FoRP, Chair FiT
15.00 Murrayfield Wanderers Select vs The Co-Optimists – No1 pitch in west park
An article about the celebrations can be seen in the Edinburgh Reporter here
On the 8th January, the Friends of Roseburn Park were delighted to receive a donation of £250 from a masonic group based at Roseburn Gardens. The donation was on behalf of the RWM (Right Worshipful Master), his Office Bearers and Brethren of Lodge Robert Burns Initiated 1781.
Pictured from the masons are Asst. Treasurer Ricky Jones & RWM Jim Turner with FoRP chair Jim McDonagh in the centre..
Also present from the Masons was Treasurer Jim Godfrey.
The donation will be used to support capital projects and other initiatives in the park including the possible introduction of communal tubs & planters.
The meeting should last about an hour.
If you would like to attend, please email friendsofroseburnmembership@gmail.com and you will be sent the link for the meeting.
FoRP members have been emailed with an invitation. If you are not a member, please join for free at Join for Free! | Friends of Roseburn Park (SCIO)
You can see the papers for the meeting at http://friendsofroseburnpark.org.uk/files/2024/09/Friends_of_Roseburn_Park_AGM_2024_papers.pdf
Volunteers from Friends of Roseburn Park’s task force, led by our Secretary, Barbara Knowles in May 2020, watering the many new trees planted over the past couple of years:
The baby trees dry out quickly and need plenty of watering in dry periods. Note the COVID 2-metre distance is being followed!
TWO CHERRY TREES TO BE CUT DOWN
Later this week, the Council will be removing two trees from the Park – they are very obvious as all their loose twigs/branches have been removed. They are just two trunks and main limbs at present. They are diseased; the bark has a fungal infection which could spread to the rest of the Cherry trees. The whole avenue of Cherries is under stress, as the tarmac is too close to the trees. Replacement trees will be funded by the Council.
REFURBISHMENT TARGET £78,000
We are fundraising to convert our disused toilet block into a charming snug cafe.
The block sits on the Water of Leith path, in the shadow of Murrayfield Stadium;
as a community café it will help support local jobs and volunteering
opportunities, while providing a warm and accessible space for local people
to meet up. Not only does the conversion have the backing of residents, it
has planning permission and the support of the Council who’ve agreed to a
lease. Income from the cafe will help to support the Friends’ other projects
to improve the amenity and quality of the Park.
We started crowdfunding in September 2019 on the same date as our Mural launch and since then we’ve raised £11,632 with our “buy a brick” scheme (with Gift Aid), which has now closed. We are presently submitting funding bids for the remaining cash and hope to have positive news by Xmas 2020.
To see our business plan for the cafe, click here.
See our
The West Edinburgh Neighbourhood Partnership (part of the Council) has funded 4 replacement trees on the west side of Roseburn park with a grant to FoRP of £586. We added £173 of our own and the local Parks budget put in £105, to meet the total cost of £864. We have got a walnut at either end and a large-leaved lime and black poplar in the middle. It’s very open to the wind here and we hope in due course this line of trees, which will line up with the rowans put in two years ago, will form a wind break.
This was because 8 new trees put here in 2017 were damaged by wind and/ or vandalised so badly they needed replacing. These were trees that were planted by the floodworks contractor, after 30 were felled due to the floodworks prevention programme. There were originally 9 planted at this location. 7 have been damaged/vandalised but our Council Trees and Woodlands Officer, reckons that the originals were planted too close together and were prone to wind blast.
The Trees Officer advised that, given the prominence of the location, replacements need to be standard tree size with a triple stake and cage protection to ensure they get established. The stock grown at the Council nursery was too small for this so we would bought trees in.
The Trees were installed by Tom Dixon of TD Landscaping, the Council’s framework contractor, approved to undertake park tree planting. Volunteer planting was not advised as the ground conditions are quite tough. The flood prevention contractor used this area as their site compound and the ground here is highly compacted due to the heavy equipment and materials stored at this location.
Following our concerns, last November the Tree Officer tried to contact the Project Manager for the flood prevention works and discovered the trees were not covered by the contract for replacements, especially if vandalism involved. In January we met one of the Rangers and discussed budgets. At that time it was suggested there might be scope for funding from monies left over in 2018/19 budget. Subsequent discovery that further savings had been demanded in the Parks budget, so no funds were available from this source. In the long term, FoRP anticipates these new trees will become another reason to visit the park.
