55 Abbeyhill is a Grade B listed building in the City of Edinburgh local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 26 September 2008. Former police station. 1 related planning application.

55 Abbeyhill

WRENN ID
woven-pilaster-river
Grade
B
Local Planning Authority
City of Edinburgh
Constituency
Edinburgh East and Musselburgh MP: Chris Murray (Lab)
Country
Scotland
Date first listed
26 September 2008
Type
Former police station
OS grid reference
NT 268 741
Coordinates
55.95442, -3.17367
Source
Historic Environment Scotland listing

Also on this page: related consents · flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

55 Abbeyhill is a single-storey, six-bay former police station built in 1896 by Robert Morham. This irregular-plan building features a castellated Romanesque style with prominent corner turrets that have conical roofs covered in fishscale slates and advanced finials. The exterior is made of snecked, rock-faced red sandstone and includes a deep chamfered base course and a band course. Distinctive animal figure gargoyles adorn the structure.

The central entrance has a round-arched chamfered doorway with a recessed two-leaf studded timber door and a semi-circular fanlight above. The windows are round-arched with roll-moulded architraves, some featuring stone column mullions. The turrets are topped with gabled, louvred timber lucarnes.

Later additions include metal grids that obscure some windows. The roof is finished with grey slates and red ridge tiles that have ball finial details, while cast iron rainwater goods with decorative hoppers complete the building's exterior.

Local climate

55 Abbeyhill sits in a wetter-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 970 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 76% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 53% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 43 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 81% of listed buildings. Of these, 25 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

More on this building

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  • No EPC on record for this property
  • No sale records on file
  • Related listed building consents — 1 application
  • Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
  • Flood risk assessment
  • Radon risk assessment
  • Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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