Don't put Glasgow's heritage under threat by building high

The Herald Scotland

10-06-2025

The proposed policy of tower clusters in areas outside the immediate centre is flawed unless you have back-up transport infrastructure. Anybody who has been to New York will know that at rush hour all the skyscrapers discharge people onto the street so that within minutes you can hardly move. The difference is they have the bus and underground systems that can rapidly disperse this mass of people.
On the Broomielaw I've seen people being discharged en masse from the high buildings along Atlantic Quay. They then try to cross to the Clyde Walkway whilst busy on their mobile phones. I've lost count of the near misses I've seen with buses.
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In economic terms, off-centre tall building clusters may attract new businesses to a deprived area but they also remove the clientele from the pubs and restaurants in the city centre. In extreme cases the latter will relocate. This may be good for regeneration but it's bad for critical mass.
To make things worse, the student blocks I've seen are badly designed, with minimal space standards, if any. That makes them difficult to adapt to alternate uses. This is relevant because there are an estimated 16,000 student places in the planning pipeline yet the current predicted need is only for 6,000 places.
With further restrictions on student immigration proposed, plus a decline in course options due to funding issues, then we are not only destroying the existing urban grain but we are also in danger of simply creating tomorrow's empty buildings.
In urban design terms, setting the towers back from the street facade to minimise their visual dominance fails to take into account the need for firefighting and escape via the tower core. This will require a protected tunnel to the street, thereby fragmenting any retail space at ground level. Retailers like Primark prefer large open plan areas to provide maximum flexibility, so that's another negative.
Building high is therefore not the answer. Renovate what's already there first. You can do that by getting the government to remove VAT on refurbishment in tandem with tax breaks. Then use these to provide the incentive for conserving Glasgow's unique heritage rather than put it under greater threat.
Robert Menzies, Falkirk.
Urgent case for defence reform
Introducing the Defence Review, the Prime Minister repeated words he heard in HMS Vanguard: 'nothing works unless we all work together.
Money is short. The Defence Secretary spoke of 'defence reform' and he should question the need for three services.
Most of the RAF's 30,000 personnel are in the UK, as are most of its 500 aircraft (including 46 support aircraft, 37 helicopters, 160 trainers, 90 gliders).
The RAF has 75% of all MoD aircraft and 50% of front-line aircraft, the other half Army or Navy. Only 20% of RAF personnel have flying duties, most of its 'aviators' are ground crew or support staff, yet 20% are officers – including 40 air marshals and 100 air commodores.
Most RAF operations support land forces, some support Maritime Britain. With sixty uniformed personnel for every aircraft, trainer and glider, the £10bn+ a year RAF, with its ten display teams, seems over-manned and under-employed. In times of plenty all this may be justifiable – it's not today.
Defence costs too much to maintain three services. Unsentimental re-organisation of HM Forces would help make them 'battle-ready', providing huge savings and advancing the government's 'Defence Dividend'. The two services would emerge leaner and more cost-effective and, importantly, be operationally more efficient with no loss of air capability.
'NATO first' would be better achieved by the UK being tasked as the principal maritime power in the eastern Atlantic, the land powers of the Continent providing the principal armies.
The Defence Review should prompt radical change here and in NATO.
Lester May (Lieutenant Commander, Royal Navy – retired), Camden Town, London.
Great Scott? No, not really
Far from wondering why people wouldn't thank you for a set of Scott's novels, most of which are currently gathering dust on library shelves, I am mystified by the fact that they were ever popular ('Scotland's greatest novelist is the Great Unread', The Herald Magazine, May 31.)
Having read more of them than some of those who affect to esteem them are likely to have done, I can report that neglect is richly deserved. Rosemary Goring attributes the neglect to unfashionably great length, but this hasn't prevented Dickens from remaining popular with those who read books.
Ms Goring concludes the article by saying that Rob Roy had her hooked from the opening page. If you, sir, were to print the opening paragraphs of Rob Roy, I feel sure that most readers would join me in marvelling that anyone could find this to be page-turning stuff.
Scott compares to Dickens as Spenser does to Milton, Constable to Turner or Handel to Bach. Technically proficient though he was, his work belongs to its time, and no amount of harrumphing by aesthetic obscurantists will alter the fact he is now just a name in the history of literature.
Robin Dow, Rothesay.
Guiding Scotland to a really tough game
Horray for Scotland's magnificent victory over Liechtenstein (population somewhat less than Greenock). Let's hope that they can keep up the momentum. Perhaps they could squeeze in another demanding friendly before the World Cup. Mosspark Girl Guides might provide suitable opposition.
David Hay, Minard.
* Whatever has happened to the Scotland team over the last 12 months?
I know they had a few players missing through injury, that it has been a very long season, that the Iceland game last Friday was just a friendly, and that the substitute keeper has hardy played in months. Even so, it was a troublingly dire performance all round. Nothing can excuse it.
R Mackenzie, Edinburgh.