The flood protection protestors who want to preserve the Esk from “hard engineering” may not realise how much artificial engineering has been required in past years to keep the river within its by-now thoroughly unnatural bounds.

The most obvious of these works is the massive retaining wall, several metres in height, between the Roman Bridge and the ex-railway bridge that was built in the 19th century to prevent the railway station tracks and platforms from sliding into the river.

A hundred years before that, an artificial channel a mile long (in which the Esk still runs) was dug out above the mill weir.

The weir itself, of course, was constructed in the mid-1500s in order to divert a significant proportion of the river’s flow into the completely artificial Mill Lade.

Both riverbanks below the Rennie Bridge are engineered structures, built in the 20th century.

Without their constraint, the OS map of 1853 shows that the river at Goose Green was then more than twice as wide as it now is.

In effect, two thirds of the housing at Goose Green is built on reclaimed land, and the artificial structure that supports this is easily seen from the opposite bank.

Of course, it would be wonderful news if the challenges presented by sea level rises and increased rainfall could be met by simple changes to land management practice in the river’s catchment area.

But this ‘proposal’ could only be assessed if it was spelt out in considerably greater detail than the vague phrase “nature-based solutions”.

Until it is, I very much hope that the planning process democratically sanctioned by East Lothian Council is pushed forward with all reasonable dispatch.

Andrew Coulson

Eskside West

Musselburgh