Vinegar Tom wrote:...finally tracked down the location of Burnside Loch. Nowhere near where I thought it was - the former boating pond is now football pitches...
I knew where the site of Burnside Loch was but I didn't know it had been used as a boating pond.
I'm certain I've seen other old maps that show the loch went dry in summer, which would suggest it was more akin to a marsh than a loch. If that's the case, it's surprising that it could support boating activities. I'm guessing that man-made changes were necessary to enable boating though, as the map extract you posted shows a sluice where the burn left the loch at its western end (I'm sure there was no indication of a sluice on the other old maps) - that indicates the depth of water in the loch was being controlled and the obvious supposition would be that the reason for doing so was to artificially raise the water level.
You may be interested to know that the burn still exists, though almost wholly (if not completely) in culverted form. It flows in a general westerly direction before joining with another other burn from slightly further south (i.e. the one that
runs along the southern boundary of 42 Burnside Road) just before Fernhill Road. There is (or at least was, in recent years) a very short (no more than a couple of metres) open section in the rear garden of one of the properties on the north side of Crawfurd Gardens.
Quite a few burns/culverts can be found in that area (e.g. the Whitlaw Burn). The Scion Burn is one that I have an interest in at the moment - its source is located somewhere in the general vicinity of the eastern end of Blairbeth Road. It is completely culverted all the way down to the Clyde, with the exception of a very short (about 1 metre) open section behind 10 Glenlui Avenue. A few years ago, I managed to trace it as far upstream as an access chamber at the
entrance to Blairbeth Terrace. Over recent months, Scottish Water and South Lanarkshire Council have jointly been CCTV surveying most of the stretch of the burn culvert from
Blairtum Drive to the
former Richmond Laundry site and have uncovered one or two interesting things, such as large uncharted culverts that join it (including one big enough to walk up if you crouch!).