Author: Scott Mackay

Back lane repairs – email to Council

To Donald Linn (Senior Geologist, Glasgow City Council and project manager for the Strathbungo Mine Consolidation Works),

just letting you know that I am very concerned and disappointed by the poor quality of the work being done so far to repair the back lanes.  So far in Queen Square, Forkers have merely taken up a section down one side (about 1m width of the lane width) where the worst of the holes were and relaid those stones.  The level of the relaid stones is much lower than the rest of the lane and therefore although this has repaired the holes, it has done nothing to resolve the level differences and camber in the lane which will not resolve the recurring problems of silt/mud and water collecting in these lower areas which caused the break up of the lane in the first place.  With a bit of forethought here it would have been simple to use a little more sand and hardcore to being the level up to the rest of the lane.  By making the lane more level (like the bottom half of Queen Square lane is) it would make it more usable for pedestrians.  Furthermore, the lane is now half a foot lower than our cobbled parking space leaving a large step down which when we try to park our car will cause our cobbles to destabilise and break off.  I spoke to the site foreman and his words were ‘we are doing the minimum to the lanes’ and ‘if you want we will put some hardcore down to bring the level up to your garden’.

This really is not what we expected and is not any significant improvement upon on what existed before.  It certainly does not look like value for the Council’s £200k!  It is particularly disappointing given all the effort the Strathbungo Society, Community Council and Councillors, etc put into seeking a positive outcome from the mine consolidation situation.

Very disappointed.