r/Glasgow Tools

Title
Author	eenbiertje
Comment	Just to make a niggly point: Not everything in Glasgow is done by the council. The M74 was funded by Transport Scotland, with the council as the on the ground manager of the project, but like all motorways it was a national project (one time managed, funded and planned through the UK's Scotland Office, but now through the Scottish Govt and Transport Scotland). On the ski ramps not connecting to the M74 - u/WellFiredRoll gives a good explanation of why they are there in the first place (the unbuilt inner ring road), but I think you're asking why they're not used, or why the M74 doesn't connect to the M8 that way. Two reasons really. First - by the detailed planning for the M74 got seriously under way (1990s), the inner ring road had been abandoned as a concept. It was long accepted that it wouldn't be built, even in a slightly different orientation (the east flank at high street was never going to happen, making the south flank through Tradeston pointless). So the M74 was planned as a completely different motorway to the original south flank of the ring road, despite serving similar purposes and having a similar general route once southeast of the city. Anyway the main point is that when the M74 was being planned as its own project in the 1990s, there was no need for it to take such a hard easterly approach to the Kingston Bridge (i.e. through Tradeston. Doing this would've been possible, but more costly in terms of necessary demolitions. The path it ended up taking meant fewer (possibly no?) demolitions, and also got the motorway to the West Coast Mainline corridor quicker, rather than having to bulldoze through the Gorbals / Southern Necropolis / parts of Glasgow Green etc. Second reason - you could add a connection between M74 and M8 today, but it would be quite a complicated project, involving a new plan for all the slip roads. The junction with the Clydeside Expressway is the difficulty, as you'd need to find some way of managing so many on and off ramps so close together. You could maybe introduce more lanes, or deal with the width you've got, but that would probably mean imposing strict speed limits around that area of the motorway network, to handle the short distances between different off and on ramps. That might be what happens eventually.
Reddit Link	https://www.reddit.com/r/glasgow/comments/sqm3d4/just_wondering_why_the_council_never_joined_the/hwmm118/
Created	Sat 12th Feb 2022 9:59am
Status	normal ()

Just to make a niggly point: Not everything in Glasgow is done by the council.

The M74 was funded by Transport Scotland, with the council as the on the ground manager of the project, but like all motorways it was a national project (one time managed, funded and planned through the UK's Scotland Office, but now through the Scottish Govt and Transport Scotland).

On the ski ramps not connecting to the M74 - u/WellFiredRoll gives a good explanation of why they are there in the first place (the unbuilt inner ring road), but I think you're asking why they're not used, or why the M74 doesn't connect to the M8 that way.

Two reasons really.

First - by the detailed planning for the M74 got seriously under way (1990s), the inner ring road had been abandoned as a concept. It was long accepted that it wouldn't be built, even in a slightly different orientation (the east flank at high street was never going to happen, making the south flank through Tradeston pointless).

So the M74 was planned as a completely different motorway to the original south flank of the ring road, despite serving similar purposes and having a similar general route once southeast of the city.

Anyway the main point is that when the M74 was being planned as its own project in the 1990s, there was no need for it to take such a hard easterly approach to the Kingston Bridge (i.e. through Tradeston.

Doing this would've been possible, but more costly in terms of necessary demolitions.

The path it ended up taking meant fewer (possibly no?) demolitions, and also got the motorway to the West Coast Mainline corridor quicker, rather than having to bulldoze through the Gorbals / Southern Necropolis / parts of Glasgow Green etc.

Second reason - you could add a connection between M74 and M8 today, but it would be quite a complicated project, involving a new plan for all the slip roads. The junction with the Clydeside Expressway is the difficulty, as you'd need to find some way of managing so many on and off ramps so close together.

You could maybe introduce more lanes, or deal with the width you've got, but that would probably mean imposing strict speed limits around that area of the motorway network, to handle the short distances between different off and on ramps. That might be what happens eventually.