by Alasdair » Mon Feb 20, 2006 4:49 pm
The funny thing is that a lot of it DID happen.
Many of the blue lines on the map (except for Great Western Road) show where a motorway now is. Many of the red lines on the map indicate where an expressway now is (Clydeside, Springburn, East Kilbride, Cumbernauld). The difference is that the planners daren't call them 'motorways' because they don't have hard shoulders, but they're still heavy-polluting roads that cut through communities.
Most of the other lines on the map (e.g. the 'Kilmarnock Expressway', Maryhill Road, Great Western Road, old A8) are now 'urban free ways' where cars aren't allowed to park. With a few big exceptions near the city centre, thank goodness, and in East Dunbartonshire, where the planners didn't really get their way at all.
I don't know, but although they used the terms 'motorway', 'expressway' and 'bypass' too freely, most of what was in these plans has now been achieved. It's a shame, but even now there are probably some scary maps in existence which plan to tear up the city and green belt with more roads.