Developer’s “revised” Musselburgh student block is now taller, not smaller, campaigners reveal

Campaigners fighting plans for a 290-bed student development on Musselburgh Newhailes Road say revised drawings, submitted to address planning and community concerns, show that the building has actually grown taller, while the flagship green roof that underpinned the biodiversity claims has been massively reduced.

Harbour Point Business Centres Ltd recently resubmitted updated plans and a Supporting Planning Statement in August for the six-story, 290-bedroom scheme on the site of the existing Harbour Point office building. The update follows objections from Residents, the Musselburgh Conservation Society and Musselburgh Community Council, who have all called the scheme “clear overdevelopment” on the basis of scale, massing and completely out of the character of the area.

Building Height Increased

The original Design and Access Statement (2025) put the crest of the building's set-back top story as 26.61 metres. The raised elevation 11 May 2026 “Revised Scheme V1.0”, shows the height of the building now reaching 29.87 metres., an increase of 2.36 metres or around 12%.

Green Roof

The original scheme’s Design and Access Statement described an "extensive green roof” of 1,710 square metres as critical to its biodiversity net gain and drainage strategy. The revised Design and Access Statement Addendum confirms the roofscape has since been redesigned to introduce “pitched roof forms and dormers”, significantly reducing the green roof area that the developer’s own biodiversity statement relied on to justify its ecological uplift claims.

Scale driven by the market, not local need

Campaigners also point to the developer’s own Supporting Planning Statement as evidence the scheme’s scale was never designed or assessed based on local demand. Paragraph 5.3 of the supporting planning statement.

“A critical mass of students is needed to attract student housing operators to a location which does not have any other facilities of this nature and the scale of the development is therefore designed to attract operators to East Lothian for the first time”

Stop Harbour Point says this confirms what residents have argued throughout, that the 290 bed figure (now revised to 269) was set to make the site commercially attractive, not to meet any demonstrated shortfall in accommodation for students at Queen Margaret or Edinburgh College’s nearby campus. The plan needs to be rooted in whether 269 occupant rooms is appropriate planning scale for the location, Not what will make the developers business plan attractive to operators.

Stop Harbour Point (stopharbourpoint.com) , the residents’ group opposing the scheme, says the changes to the plan undermine the developer’s public position that the revised plans respond to community feedback.

Scott McBay a spokesman for the group said

“At the public consultation the developers team preached about the positive environmental impact of the green roof and the lower height of the building compared to other buildings in Musselburgh. These claims are now untrue, this is yet another example of a developer misleading the public. It’s interesting to note, these comparisons have been quietly dropped from the revised statement and plans.

The scheme is a poorly conceived attempt to force a city centre development into a townscape that doesn’t have the infrastructure to support 269 additional residents. This building has been designed to be “car-free”, a single accessible parking bay for 269 residents, with zero parking provision.

Newhailes Road will have to absorb that traffic another way, through taxis, drop offs, deliveries, significantly increasing traffic and parking issues for all residents of Musselburgh.

We have nothing against student accommodation, but in an appropriate location that can be supported by appropriate infrastructure.

Background

The application has already drawn numerous formal objections about the Scheme’s “massing and density” are entirely out of character with the surrounding area.

Newhailes road is a tree lined road with buildings set back from the road, The felling of mature trees by the developers has already had a negative impact on the look and feel of the areas as well as the environmental impact.

Objectors argue the scheme breaches the established building line and three storey scale of Newhailes Road, and question whether the town’s infrastructure, including GP capacity and a single disabled parking space for 269 residents, can support the development.

Stop Harbour Point is urging the people of Musselburgh to submit fresh objections to East Lothian Council before the 1st September deadline. Citing the revised height and reduced green roof as evidence the Scheme has moved further not closer to addressing community concerns.

Notes to editors:

Planning application reference: 25/01247/PM

Application documents: pa.eastlothian.gov.uk (search reference above)

Campaign website: stopharbourpoint.com

Height, green roof, bed count and "critical mass" figures are all taken directly from the applicant's own submitted drawings and statements, available on the council's public planning portal. Stop Harbour Point can provide the specific drawing references (P)009/(P)010 [revised elevations] and the original and updated Supporting Planning Statements (paragraph 5.3 in each) on request.

Photographs available on request: [site photos, felled tree stumps, comparison of original vs revised elevation drawings]