Edinburgh has a world famous skyline

He said this should be on a similar scale to that carried out by James Craig with the construction of Edinburgh's New Town in the 18th century.

Mr Reid believes his vision, which over time would include the demolition of many of the street's listed buildings, would transform the Scottish capital into one of Europe's leading shopping destinations.

Only "high quality buildings" such as the Jenners department store would survive under his plan.

He said: "Very many of the buildings are simply not capable of adaptation for modern retailing requirements or matching the standards expected by the retailer or the customer.

"What we would like to do is to generate a bit of debate on the feasibility of replacing over time a very high proportion of buildings on Princes Street.

"Very, very few of them are original buildings, quite a significant proportion are post-war, and I don't think there's a tremendous love for many of them at the moment."

The Mound leads down to Princes Street

He added: "Princes Street is probably the only area of the city centre which dies a bit after the retail hours, while other streets have tremendous activity, vibrancy and nightlife, and we think that can be extended to Princes Street as well."

Mr Reid, who oversaw the transformation of Dundee city centre in the 1990s, said he was now seeking the views of business and the public.

He insisted he was not proposing "a simultaneous whole-scale demolition" but progress in a reasonable timescale.

"What we can say is James Craig's master plan wasn't delivered in a couple of years, but took some decades to come to fruition," he said.

"So what we want is a masterplan, intended to create market confidence and the market will choose how quickly we deliver it.

"We do hope for a positive response and if we have that, I think we can take Edinburgh to a new level.

"It already has one of the finest and most beautiful city centres, but I think we can take it a quantum leap."

Edinburgh City Council leader Donald Anderson agreed there had been some "terrible mistakes" on Princes Street and improvements had to be made.

However, he said much more consultation was needed.