Pacific Quay is a real place

I don’t know when the name officially entered Glasgow’s list of street names (that fact may be recorded in some well buried council minutes), but it has to have happened after the Glasgow Garden Festival, when the derelict land it lives on was recycled after the 1988 festival.

I just can’t get used to it since I don’t associate anything ‘Pacific’ with Glasgow.

It’s not going away any time soon, so I will have to get used to it.

I was crossing Bell’s Bridge (which WAS created as pedestrian access across the River Clyde for the festival), when I happened to turn around a look downriver, and the scene looked have decent and worth reaching for the camera, mainly because the IMAX was almost centre view, and I had recently mentioned it had lost its operating leaseholder, which mean that unless somebody steps in and takes over, all that really there is a cute, but empty, building.

Pacific Quay has interesting residents – STV moved there from Cowcaddens (sorry, that building is off to the left, too far to include in this shot), and ended up next to the competition, as the BBC moved there from its home in Queen Margaret Drive.

So, there’s the BBC on the left, then the (maybe former) IMAX blobby building (it may look odd, but it seemed to suit the IMAX installation), then the Glasgow Science Centre (seemingly as success now after barely being able to attract finding when it opened), the Glasgow Tower (which has been a disaster since the day it was built, and a record holding embarrassment), and finally, rather small since I was standing at the wrong end of this few in terms of scale, the paddle steamer Waverley.

Not ONE of those features is controversy free.

The BBC is constantly beset by whining protestors complaining about it being English, despite the name BBC Scotland.

As noted, the IMAX theatre has just lost its leaseholder.

The science centre was a funding nightmare when it opened, and had to close almost immediately, before being reopened.

The useless tower was bust from the day it opened, and also had to close repeatedly as it turns out the bearing that should have allowed the whole building to rotate with the wind were junk, and had to be replaced. It’s also a bit of a joke, given the number of people that can get into the lift (if/when it works) and make the trip to the top for the view. Somebody did NOT think this thing through, and the words ‘Vanity Project’ flit through my mind when I see it nowadays.

The poor old Waverley, the last sea-going paddle steamer, has to constantly beg for funds since ticket sales don’t make enough to fund her, and sadly, she seems drawn to piers as if by a magnet, and crashes with some regularity, losing paying days while in dock, possibly being sued for injuries, all of which means the economics must be a nightmare.

Seriously – why can’t I write about all of those items in terms of success and profit, instead of being able to think of only bad things seen in the news?

Oh well…

At least it’s a nice pic.

And, again, I’m sorry it was the taken from the wrong ‘end’, and the Waverley was the smallest and furthest away subject.

Pacific Quay

Former BBC Scotland headquarters building

Another one pulled from the unused archives, and which is so boring it would have stayed there, but for the pandemic lockdown.

This pic is probably a couple of years old now, the building lies in Queen Margaret Drive, which is probably enough of a clue to for some to trigger memories of it being the headquarters of BBC Scotland until 2007, when this was relocated in a new building next to the River Clyde.

The building was later acquired by another business, so has not become derelict.

I only took the pic as I noticed the building as I was passing by one day, on my way elsewhere, and grabbed it as it’s not really somewhere I land very often.

Can you spot the two cars encroaching either side of the entrance?

I don’t know why I bothered, but the two parked cars really irritated me, although they weren’t near the building or gate.

Just for fun, I decided to try removing them, and see how noticeable their removal was.

The day was really dull and grey, so the image (even the original) isn’t particularly great, so it wasn’t as hard as I had anticipated, nor did it take as long as I thought it might.

BBC Queen Margaret Drive

A little further to the right of the first pic location was a view over the wall, looking into a forecourt, and what appears to be the meeting of two buildings of apparently different eras.

The building on the left looks much newer than the one coming from the right.

However, it looks as if the windows of that left hand building have all been replaced with a rather nasty type of modern, white finished and mass-produced type, which may be a similar shape to the period originals, but I think are definitely not of the same appearance or finish.

I’m almost surprised Glasgow’s planning department gave permission, but the redeveloper may have managed to sneak these horrors in under cover of a large, multi paged application, where they were lost in the detail, possibly with some cleaver ‘weasel wording’.

Just my thought via the MKI eyeball, I have no actual details.

Queen Margaret Drive Forecourt

I’m not 100% sure now, thanks to not being a regular in this area, but I think there may have been work carried out in/on this forecourt area.

I have a recollection of seeing it full of builder’s goodies, and scaffolding, but I can’t place the memory – not can I easily nip back for a quick look.

Maybe one day I’ll get another look, and be able to tell if there’s a noticeable difference.