Inside the urban planning offices of Glasgow City Council since time immemorial, fluorescent lights buzz and flicker. It’s too hot in winter, too cold in summer. Keyboards clack, computers hum. And Rip it Up by Orange Juice pulses through a built-in loudspeaker on repeat. Rip it up and start again. Rip it up and start again. Rip it up and start again. Into eternity. I’ve never been inside the council’s planning offices but I’m confident this is what I would find inside. Regardless of the decade.

Scotland’s largest city has been on the receiving end of some seriously poor urban planning decisions. Including, notoriously, ploughing the M8 through its heart. I would argue it was the worst urban planning decision ever made. Communities across the city were ripped apart, people’s sense of place completely wiped out. In financial terms, it was one of the most expensive infrastructure projects in Scotland at the time. The cost to the city’s culture and cohesion was priceless.

But this is not the only time the city has been let down by its local authority. The Squinty Bridge cost £20.3 million and was open just shy of a year before a cable snapped and it was closed for six months. It wasn’t a silver bullet for the city’s congestion issues and there are concerns its low height (5.4m above the river) prevents the River Clyde from being a fully working river. But it looks nice on postcards and on the evening news.

Another let-down was the Glasgow Airport Rail Link. It cost £30 million in land, compensation and other costs before it was scrapped.........

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