FOR five decades, Glasgow's biggest village in the sky has towered over the city's landscape. Loved by some; hated by others, they are the iconic Red Road flats.
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FOR five decades, Glasgow's biggest village in the sky has towered over the city's landscape. Loved by some; hated by others, they are the iconic Red Road flats.
Over the years, they have rarely been out of the headlines. The 2006 film Red Road, told the story of the flats through the eyes of a CCTV operator. And, in 2007, Didier Pasquette attempted a tightrope walk between two of the blocks.
The flats have now had their day and next spring they will begin to be razed to the ground. But before that happens, the story of the flats is being documented online.
Today, SHEILA HAMILTON begins a three-part series on the flats with the story of how it all began...
IT is a photograph to make you gulp and then look away quickly. Yes, the one of the scaffolders as close to the clouds as you could get in Glasgow without wings.
It was daredevils like Dennistoun man James Foy, on the left of this picture, who worked on the construction of the Red Road flats often without a safety net or harness.
James and his fellow 'steel fixer' were bolting steel beams together on 10 Red Road Court when this photo was taken in the early Sixties.
Built on a former cabbage patch, the Red Road flats were hailed as the tallest residential buildings in Europe. Less than half a century later, when the tallest of the blocks - at 292ft - comes down, the city's skyline will be changed for good.
The flats are visible from most of the north and east of Glasgow and, from the upper floors, you have amazing views over Glasgow, the Campsie Fells, Ben Lomond and even Arran, views that are now being recorded for posterity.
"People usually have to document the history of an area after the event," said Jonny Howes, community action team officer for Culture and Sport Glasgow, which is joining forces with Glasgow Housing Association to develop a range of historical and arts-based programmes to commemorate the flats. "What we are doing is capturing it while it is still alive."
There are some who will look back in nostalgia to the early days when the flats were a good place to live. But others will surely say good riddance' when the first of them is knocked down next spring after the asbestos has been stripped off the building, leaving just the steel structure to be demolished.
Up close, the flats are intimidating; huge, forbidding canyons of concrete which deteriorated far too quickly and soon became a byword for vandalism, violence and crime.
Gangs and drug users made tenants' lives a misery and, to the rest of the city, the Red Road was a no-go area'.
It was a sad end to a bold experiment greeted with much fanfare in the Sixties.
Back then, Glasgow was a city aiming to go up in the world and the mantra was the higher, the better'.
The eight blocks in Balornock and Barmulloch - two of 25 floors and six towers of 31 floors - were at first a proud symbol of Glasgow Corporation's housing revolution.
The city was determined to clear away the slums and provide decent houses for families who were, until this point, crammed into the typical tenement room and kitchen.
The Corporation employed architect Sam Bunton and the buildings - the only steel-framed structures in Glasgow - were to provide housing for 4700 people.
They had bathrooms and proper kitchens and there were shops, play areas, car spaces, lock ups and landscaping - the 1350 flats seemed like the Promised Land to the first tenants.
Indeed, they were that good a not-very-PC Tory councillor was heard to say: "These are too good for the working classes."
Comedian Karen Dunbar once lived in the flats, as too did Maryhill MSP Patricia Ferguson.
But now GHA, which took over the flats from the city council in 2003, plans to demolish them over a period of several years, rehousing tenants in people-friendly homes, many with gardens.
"The reason for the demolition," said a GHA spokeswoman, "is that the blocks are simply too expensive to invest in and create the kind of housing that people expect today.
"We have many multi-storey blocks around the city but we determined early on that the Red Road was unsustainable. Over time, it became obvious that the buildings required fairly major investment.
"People have moved into a variety of new homes. Some are moving to other parts of the city and, for others, this is a chance to move back to the area where they grew up.
"The feedback from the community is that people are glad of better quality, lower density accommodation."
The residents of the Red Road flats, past and present, are now being asked to reflect on their time there via www.redroadflats.org.uk, where the legacy of the village in the sky will live on in cyberspace.
Lend your voice to tales of the Red Road
HAVE you lived in the Red Road flats at any time since they were built in the Sixties? Do you still live there?
If you can answer yes to either of those questions, the team documenting the story of the flats wants to hear from you. They want your memories, good or bad, and copies of any photographs you may have.
The aim is to mark the end of an era by creating an online archive before the flats are demolished.
Visit www.redroadflats.org.uk or write, including contact details, to: Red Road Flats Project, Culture and Sport Glasgow, Petershill Business Centre. 28/30 Adamswell Street, Glasgow, G21 4DD.
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