Anderston Centre

[red_kola]

Crusty got me musing over the the spin with which the Inner Ring Road was sold to us. Along with flying cars and robot slaves, I am sure that the economic regenration of dilapidated areas was fairly high up on their list of lies.

The greatest example of this must have been the undoubtable success of the Anderston Centre.

I can barely remember it. I know it was a Bus Station until the mid 90s and I am sure it was a shopping centre as well in the 70s. Was Argos there for a while? Rings a bell. Information on the net is sparse, but i've found this page of pictures and news that at least one of the blocks of flats is soon to be toast (No Heron House style salvation, it seems). Crusty - you might like the whole site - it's called Joy of Concrete

Anyway; memories, photographs, recollections, lists of shops. Anyone got anything on this white elephant and why it ultimately failed as a shopping centre, transportation hub or business centre...?

[AMcD]

I had a wander around there on Monday morning before work... there's not much in the way of shops left now, almost all offices.

I'd often wondered what the strange wee building built on "stilts" next to the motorway junction was. Turns out it was Anderston Fire Station.

http://www.graeme.kirkwood.btinternet.co.uk/SFB/A08.htm



They've demolished the access ramp now... and built an office block in it's path.



I be surprised if they do actually demolish the flats there now... where would they rehouse everybody? There's not much affordable housing been built in Glasgow in recent years.

[DickyHart]

There was definetly a Curries there.
The Eight ball Bar
John Menzies
Im sure there was a Presto
There was still a newsagent until about a year ago.
There was a shop that sold sound equipment for Dj's
Radio Clyde had a studio there for a while.

Then theres the infamous story about the ambulance that got clamped in the tunnel. Anderston became a red light area, A girl on the game got a kicking down one of many nooks and crannies that are around there, and the ambualnce had to park in the tunnel to get to her, they could not move her for whatever reason, when they eventually did, they got back to find the ambulance had a nice big yellow clamp on the wheel.

[skintobalinto]

The Shops I remember are James McConnamys later to become Comet and Robox, the first computer shop I remember. I bought a Cheetah Speech synthesiser out of there for my TI99/4A. I also got a shot of a Sinclair C5 from Comet round the top deck of the shopping center when It was first launched. Scary - I would not have liked to take it out on a road.

[red_kola]

The Shops I remember are James McConnamys....

<snip>

Was it a big shopping centre then at one point? Buchanan Galleries sized, or merely a Sauchiehall Centre? Were all the units taken, was it busy. Did it work for a while but then fade away?

I wasn't in Glasgow in the 80s so can't remember. I did go there once to a trade conference in about 1983/4 in a hotel (?) above the shopping centre. As far as I remember it was pretty run down by then with very few units still occupied.

[DickyHart]

A lot of it was rented out as cheap office space after a lot of the shops closed. There was a coulpe of alarm sales places there until recently.

[AMcD]

I'd be surprised if they do actually demolish the flats there now... where would they rehouse everybody? There's not much affordable housing been built in Glasgow in recent years.

Quoting myself because I'm wrong as usual...

This map of the local housing plan does show Anderston for demolition..
http://www.local.housingstrategy.glasgow.gov.uk/pdf/centralconsult.pdf

[skintobalinto]

I always remember it being somewhat run down. Where McConnamys and Robox were the were a few other shops. It looked like your typical 60's shopping complex where more and more units closed down leaving only Comet at one point, After that they started to remodel it as it is now. The last time I was there was a year ago for a job interview and it looked completely different.

[martin]

Radio Clyde had a studio there for a while.

It was their home from when they started in 1974, until sometime in the 80's, when they moved to a slightly less ugly brick building in Clydebank.

[DickyHart]

wow, i didnt know they had been there that long.

[stunev]

When it outgrew the Anderston centre, Radio Clyde's first choice for a new site was at Meadowside on a piece of land that backs onto the railway line and faces Safeway.

Glasgow Council being Glasgow Council pissed them about so much that when Clydebank Council came along and gave them favourable terms on their current location without all the the buggering about, Radio Clyde told Glasgow Council what to do with their land and moved to Clydebank.

[kirkyguy]

There was a snooker hall in it...an iceland or farmfoods,there was also plenty of computer shops in there as well..i can remember going in it during the day in about 1988 saturday afternoon and there was tumbleweeds blowing around and you could here the wind whistling through the centre it was real eerie,what was even weirder was that just a 100 yards or so the town was bustling with WEOW and loads of other shops at that end of Argyle street...

[Schiehallion]

I always remember it being somewhat run down. Where McConnamys and Robox were the were a few other shops. It looked like your typical 60's shopping complex where more and more units closed down leaving only Comet at one point, After that they started to remodel it as it is now. The last time I was there was a year ago for a job interview and it looked completely different.

It was a very run down and depressing place - all concrete with walkways from one level to another although there could be big queues when Comet had a sale on. Comet revolutionised shopping with the 'pick from the catalogue' and collect at the counter' style of shopping, good brand names at cheap prices.

What was the name of the pub at the corner at the city centre end of the bus station? Was it something like The Coachman?

[My Kitten]

.graeme.kirkwood.btinternet.co.uk/SFB/A08.htm[/url]

I was in the Community Safety Centre a few times, i used to work for Safer Gorbals Project of which the CSC was a kinda supervisory body. Had a cracking crimbo party in there one year.

[Fossil]

Nobody has mentioned the moving walkway it had
You got on at ground level and it took you up to the shopping centre.
The first I think in Glasgow.
Bloody unusual at the time BTW.


-Fossil-