IT is little wonder the junction of Argyle Street, Union Street and Jamaica Street is Glasgow city centre's worst accident blackspot.

IT is little wonder the junction of Argyle Street, Union Street and Jamaica Street is Glasgow city centre's worst accident blackspot.

Around 350 buses an hour - more at peak times - travel through the junction known affectionately to generations of Glaswegians as Boots Corner.

32 casualties in 3 years

THE Argyle Street/Union Street/Jamaica Street junction has for years had the unwanted distinction of being the worst accident blackspot in the city centre.

Amazingly, there are TWICE as many accidents there than at the second worst stretch of road in the city the Stockwell Street and Trongate corner.

New figures reveal that, in the three years to December 2008, 32 people have been hurt at the Union Street jun-ction, including an 11-year old boy who escaped serious injury after being hit by a bus while crossing the road.

Glasgow City Council stat-istics show there were no fatalities but that five of the injuries were classed as "serious". The remainder involved "slight injuries".

Nine occurred between 10pm and 6am, four were at rush hour and eight happened in bad weather.

Buses were involved in nine of the accidents, taxis in eight, cars in 12 and motorbikes in three.

Alcohol was a "significant factor" in seven of the incidents.

Of those injured 21 were pedestrians, 10 were passen-gers and two were drivers.

The injuries at the notorious junction are three fewer than in the three years up to December 2007.

Most come from Renfield Street and Union Street, some from the South Side come up Jamaica Street and others from Argyle Street come under the Hielanman's Umbrella.

Add to the mix cars, taxis and tens of thousands of pedestrians - many using mobile phones or listening to iPods - crossing the road every day and you have the potential for high numbers of accidents.

Not surprisingly the junction has for years seen the highest accident rate in the city centre - twice as high as anywhere else.

In the past three years 32 people have been injured there, five seriously.

According to statistics, 21 of those injured were pedestrians, 12 of the accidents involved cars, nine buses and eight taxis.

Now road safety and traffic management bosses agree with the Evening Times that the junction, which is one of eight hotspots identified by Glasgow City Council officials, has to be made safer.

And a senior police officer today welcomed the possibility the council may try to relieve the congestion by re-routing traffic.

Chief Inspector Jim McLaughlin, the officer in charge of road safety in the city centre, also said many pedestrians were at fault.

He added: "For some reason people choose not to use the crossing facilities which are in place and they are numerous in the city centre.

"Either it's laziness, they can't be bothered waiting 30 seconds for the lights to change, or they have just seen their bus coming.

"There is maybe a bit of bravado involved too. We need to educate people who are using the city centre regularly and that means people between school age and old age pensioners.

"Perhaps we can put in a certain type of pedestrian crossing or a barrier to minimise the risk of people crossing the road at inappropriate places and inappropriate times."

He said one of the difficulties with the Argyle Street junction was that it was used by thousands of people spilling out of Central Station who are not from the city and unfamiliar with the area.

Everyone involved with traffic management - including police, council, Strathclyde Partnership for Transport and bus companies - needed to get together to come up with "something different" to solve the problem, the police chief said.

He added: "We have gone down the traditional routes such as enforcement and education and the accident figures at that specific junction are not going down, we are not eating into them like we are elsewhere.

"It may mean more radical engineering, more radical thoughts about traffic flow.

"I don't know if that's a possibility but we would be very keen to look at that.

"We may need to re-align the traffic flow, there is simply too much traffic.

"But I can't dictate things to Glasgow City Council.

"They are responsible for the road network.

"There has to be a proper balance. The city centre has to keep moving in terms of shopping and the economy.

"More public transport can cause its own problems. It is a congested city and the balance has to be got right and ultimately that is one for the politicians.

"In terms of road safety we can only work with the legislation that is in place."

Ch Insp McLaughlin said he would like to see a long-term strategy in place which would reduce the number of buses using city centre streets.

He added: "We need buses coming into the area because that's what Glasgow City Council is trying to promote.

"I would like to get that streamlined in a way that gives us the maximum number of people using the minimum number of buses.

"We will support any proposals that mean a reduction in the vast number of buses using the city centre."

Robert Booth, executive director of land and environmental services said: "We have introduced road safety measures at this particular junction.

"We have moved the stop line 3m back to create a buffer zone and introduced extra signal poles and adjusted lane linings.

"We continue to monitor the situation and are determined to reduce the risk as far as possible."