Then & Now Dumbarton Road, Peel Street Corner

4 5 Housing Association’s 1st New Build Eldon Court

Eddie Murray (former warden at Eldon Court)

Housing Associations Change Memories “It could be argued that community-based “Partick has changed from when I started. “I remember when I was growing up in Partick, we housing associations, particularly in , Dumbarton Road had lots of tenements and were all talking about where we were going to go have been the most significant development big department stores, but at the start of the when they demolished the tenements. Thankfully in since the Second World War, 80s there were major changes to the economy. that was stopped, but we lost a lot of good housing particularly in terms of community engagement There was a lot of unemployment and from and replaced it with housing that probably wasn’t and physical transformation. I can vaguely there you had marital breakdowns and the as good as the buildings they demolished. So I remember Glasgow with its black tenements, the big department stores started closing down. became aware that it was changing, and that the housing association was now looking to refurbish “Eldon Court was a new-build complex; I think there were about 36 housing legacy of industrial pollution. The stone-cleaning Dumbarton Road is very different now with and improve the housing stock and maintain it. units on it and a common room. Eight of those tenancies were solely for dramatically changed the look of the city. We small businesses, charity shops and cafes. That would be the mid-70s when I became aware people with mental health problems. Our referral source was Gartnavel Royal would probably be some characterless modern Housing conditions are much improved from that these things were happening. city, so it’s preserved the neighbourhoods like Hospital. The idea was to integrate the people with mental health issues into when I started. When I arrived the Association , Partick and . There was that feeling that all the tenements the wider community because a lot of those tenants had spent an awful long was modernising a lot of properties and I was were going to go and be replaced with multi- time in Gartnavel and other institutions. The committee saw the housing association as taken to see the conditions people were living stories – that was the modern thinking at that a way of retaining the community, but if you in. I also got to see the properties they could Partick did their homework and obviously knew this was going to happen prior time, everyone was going to live in a tower block. were getting public money then you had to be living in, and most people were quite happy to it actually being built. The then Housing Manager, Stuart Montgomery, Fortunately, that changed before it was too late. and his staff had carried out quite a bit of research into people who were on allocate houses on the level of housing needs, back then to sell us their properties. We re- Since then I’ve been aware of Partick Housing the register for housing in Partick, so anyone who was offered a mainstream so there was always that tension between housed them as tenants and they got a nice Association and the good work they’re doing in tenancy knew all about this – they were told what was going to happen. balanced communities and the needs of various new flat. I didn’t realise that people had outside the area. Partick is attractive to private developers groups. One committee would go on about toilets and that people didn’t have baths – I There were a number of meetings in the common room, where the supported – student accommodation is the latest thing – “undesirables coming in from ”, didn’t really know much about social-rented and the danger has always been that private tenants and mainstream tenants actually did lots of things together, like setting for instance, and of course most of the people housing when I first came here. developers come in and basically take over. up a library and cooking afternoons, you know, they got to know each other. living in Drumchapel had originally lived in There was definitely a lot of input from Partick to make sure that it would It’s also a more diverse place than it was Having a large social-housing landlord in the Partick. My housing manager at that time knew happen because it was a new type of initiative, certainly in Scotland. All in before and now we publish things in different area maintains the stock of housing for local most of the tenants personally and she said all, there were never any problems between the mainstream tenants and the languages and over the years we’ve re- people and looks to build new homes whenever ‘if you do a study, if you look at who are the supported tenants. housed a lot of people from different ethnic it can. It gives that cohesion, providing the glue awkward tenants, it’s actually the people who backgrounds”. that holds the community together. Partick still To my knowledge, Partick was the first housing association in Scotland have lived here for generations’. I don’t know has a fairly good sense of community, perhaps Fiona Adams, PHA to develop a project like this and led the way in that type of supported if that would live up to academic scrutiny but better than some areas. I think Partick Housing accommodation”. that’s a story that I like. has helped to maintain that”. Rod Hunter, former CEO Kenny McLean, local resident & Councillor

6 7 Then & Now Elie Street looking to Chancellor Street

Housing Associations Leslie Milne, Chair, PHA Board

“I remember the original tenements It was becoming obvious that investment allocation, so they had to find vacant because I lived in one as a child. It was in was needed in the external fabric of the properties which had been improved to such a poor state that it was condemned buildings and the backcourts and then rehouse those residents displaced by the by Glasgow Corporation. In those days – there was a breakthrough– over in amalgamations. the late 1950s/early1960s – the solution – when the housing association movement One of the things that the housing was to knock everything down, including in its modern form really started. associations started to do in the mid-to- backstreet industries. I remember that on The first thing that happened was putting late 80s was to build new property. There the other side of our backcourt behind the baths and toilets into tenement buildings. were a number of local ”gap sites” in high “midden dyke”, there was stable! (Yes, What the architects found after a bit of Partick where a tenement had once stood, horses and carts were still in use then). trial and error was that the best way with the ground lying vacant for years, Many privately-rented properties weren’t to deal with the problem was to knock so as we were nearing the end of the particularly well-managed. They tended to three flats into two on the upper floors, programme of upgrading houses which be overcrowded, but the most important removing the “single end” and to install a were below the Tolerable Standard, the thing was the lack of proper sanitation. bathroom in the ground floor flats where Association started to build houses to Not surprising that so many residents there wasn’t one. The idea was that the meet local demand. opted to move to the new Corporation best way to give some decent living space However, perhaps the most important housing schemes, the main attraction of was to encourage some of the residents to legacy of the associations - and all the which was hot and cold running water and move to another property in the area. traditional community-based associations a proper kitchen and bathroom. As a result, the newly formed residents did this – was that they saved many of Partick was particularly badly affected committees began to get involved with the the city’s tenements, which is a great by the famous storm in January 1968. factoring of the property and in housing achievement”.

8 9 Then & Now Byres Road looking down White Street Commonwealth Mural

10 11 Change Old backcourt “Because of where we are, there’s pressure Picture: on the area. There’s Byers Road and the No. 24 Stewartville Street, cosmopolitan West End. It’s an attractive place for 's old house. people to visit, but also to stay. There have been subtle changes in the area over the past number of decades; I think it’s less predominantly working class than it used to be. I think a lot of people have come in, better-off, more aspirational, more- middle-class. It’s certainly not the obvious working “For years I class area it was when I was growing up. There’s still a strong working class community here, but it probably doesn’t predominate as much as when I thought the was wee. There’s been a subtle change, and you can see club's name the wee special shops opening up: wine bars, coffee bars. There was nothing like that when I was younger”. was Partick Kenny McLean, local resident & councillor Thistle Nil.” Change New backcourt “As a housing officer, I remember taking people out to see flats and I was mortified showing people a flat and thinking ‘look at the state of this place’. People were refusing it, then you’d take someone else out and they’d refuse it as well. They were refusing it because, as much as people needed a house, if they were moving into somewhere in that condition, they’d have to do Change lots of work to make if habitable. They didn’t Partick Burgh Hall have the money, so they would’ve had to move and Fortrose House “Mansfield Park has been completely in and live there as it was. Certainly introducing redeveloped along with the buildings and the the Modernised Void Programme has really shops. There’s more variety of businesses helped with that, because the properties are coming into Partick; independent shops opening being completely renovated. up – cafes and bakers that aren’t big chains, so it’s nice to see that the commercial side has It was a hard sell, really difficult. You had to tell changed. people to look beyond what they had in front of them and think of what they could do with it, When we did the (sustainable) backcourt project and there were some people who were happy years ago (2006) on Byers Road and Chancellor with that. Those people would say the décor Street, that made a big difference. We don’t get doesn’t bother them because they could do stuff funding to do it in every backcourt, which would with it, but not everyone was capable of that. be amazing because then every backcourt would Partick will always have its tenements but there look great and be well used. The development are still people who refuse central heating, still of the allotments are having a big impact on sitting with one wee fire, because they’re older the area. People’s ideas and getting involved in and they don’t want to spend money. The the community has changed as well. I’ve been tenements add a lot to Glasgow, and now we’re working in Partick for 25 years now so I’ve seen celebrating 40 years at Partick, if that hadn’t it change quite a bit, for the better. Trying to been set up as a housing association we would’ve keep the buildings in a good state is always a just flattened the tenements”. challenge, but I think we do a good job”. Pauline Joyce, PHA Jackie Reilly, PHA

12 13 Then & Now

Merkland Street, Dumbarton Road corner

Memories “The community was a lot closer. When Partick Housing Association began, the likes of my daughter, son, neighbours and their children had to move out the area because they couldn’t get their names on the housing list. We had people from , and all different areas coming to stay in Partick, whereas a lot of the Partick people left. My son had to get a house in and my daughter went to , so the family commitment then split up. When I was a boy you could go to your auntie’s house, who would stay at the furthest, two closes away, and if you were hungry when your mother and father were out, you would go get something to eat. You can’t do that here now, there is nobody. If you chap someone’s door now, they won’t give you a piece. When we came to Partick at first, you didn’t have to go into town for a single thing. Where Farmfoods (Sainsbury’s) was on Byers Road, that was a car showroom, so you could go in and buy a car. The big shop along here (Dumbarton Road) sold everything: carpets, furniture, underwear, curtains, you name it. There was a big toy shop, Edwards, so you never needed to go out of Partick. And there was a pram shop on Dumbarton Road, you didn’t need to go into the town for anything”. Mr & Mrs Picken, tenants

14 15 Picture: Memories No.3 Stewartville Street, Anne Marie Stewart, tenant An early office for PHA. Granary

“When I read about the 40 year celebration of At the time of my first flat I had made a Partick Housing Association it took me back to promise to myself that as soon as my children my beginnings with the organisation in 1976 - were older I would try and help with the nearly 39 years ago this year - and I would like Housing Association as I felt so grateful that to share my journey - and it has been a journey! this help had been there for me in our time of great need as a family. I was in the middle of a messy divorce with four children and homeless. We were living in a I became a member for £1 and then was rented room in at the time and, to say elected to the Management Committee on the least, rather overcrowded. which I served for around 8/9 years and was the Secretary/Treasurer for a number of years. Someone told me to go to a new housing This involvement gave me great experience and association which was situated in a tenement, actually seeing the architect’s plans and then up a close in White Street in Partick. I duly went the completion of tenemental improvement and along and met a young woman called Ruth then new buildings it was so exciting. Henderson. She took my details and said that there were very few flats available but she would Our Management Committee meetings were be in contact as soon as something came up. I something I had never experienced before or “My first rent was relieved that there might be hope for us. since, arguments over the minutes of the last meeting would go on and on. I kept hearing About two weeks later I received a telephone someone shout out “Standing Orders” and had call to ask if I would be interested in a flat, was £9.00 per no idea what that meant (it meant we had to which was only a room and kitchen and adhere to the schedule as per the orders laid bathroom, was situated in Chancellor Street out for our meetings). I soon learned to say this quarter!” and was three up. I said ‘yes’ and was informed very quickly as we were sometimes not finishing be demolished, because the place was infested responsibilities and understand what makes that another person was looking at it and if they Committee / Board the meeting until very late at night. Also the with rats, there was uproar. I said at the meeting: a housing association tick. Legislation now did not take it I would get an offer. I remember There was always a constant pressure; it was AGM`s could descend into a good old Glasgow ‘we can maybe get a pied-piper person to divert allows payment to committee members, and saying to the girl on the phone that if that Scottish Homes then, and endless discussion with ‘rammy’ over issues which were causing them up to the West End?’, so you could come I’m amazed that this has passed without much person was in my situation then I doubted that I them about money and getting project approval concerns. up with the most illogical nonsense. I’m sure the comment. There’s still a strong feeling against would get it. to buy land. The committee was always strong board at Partick doesn’t now, running a multi- that in Scotland but I think in England 60% of I know that there have been many changes Two days later on a Friday evening I was asked and really quite supportive. million pounds business that’s employing 40-50 the Registered Social Landlords have paid board through the years with legislation and finance, to come in on the Saturday morning and In those days, Partick was much smaller because employees. members but I still believe that the Housing Association view the flat. I immediately agreed and so my Meadowside and Thornwood hadn’t been movement is just as vital now as it was then. I The dynamics of the way Housing Associations It’s more about management now; making sure journey with PHA had begun. incorporated. The make-up of the board at that hope that others can have the journey that my are operating today is different to when I was in tenants are happy, meeting the requirements time was about, 50% tenants and 50% owner- We’ve moved several times over the years. As family and I have experienced over these last Partick. When I was here, it was fuelled by a fairly of the regulator. The regulator’s requirements occupiers and others. There was one committee my children grew up and left home, I mutually 39 years. healthy amount of grant money for new housing are challenging for committees. There are exchanged with a young family to their three member who wasn’t making a lot of sense at the and refurbishing houses, so that was like the more business pressures, thinking about risk- The change from the dark tenements buildings apartment flat. After a while, my remaining time and he said: ‘Mankind is facing its biggest driver. The committees then were almost 100% management and stress-testing your business and new buildings in our area and the pride in child left and we moved to a one apartment flat threat’. So we were saying, ‘What is it, global tenants, and the incentive was that you would get plan. I see a greater managerial expertise among our environment has been helped enormously which was one up. Eventually the stairs became warming, nuclear obliteration?’ to which he your house done. board members, and I know that the numbers of by the involvement of PHA. a problem and then I moved to our present replied ‘rust’. tenants have decreased. I think there’s initially a What the tenants did was a massive achievement, ground floor flat which I hope is our forever By the way, my first rent was £9.00 per bit of suspicion when white-collar professionals Prior to , the granary was still albeit with support from the housing corporation, home before I reach my eternal home. quarter! come in, but they are there to bring added value, there, and even though it wasn’t really in our area, Scottish Homes, and then latterly Communities not to tell people what to do.” it was a dominant feature in the neighbourhood. Scotland, running training sessions for committee When rumours came out that it was going to members to make them appreciate their Rod Hunter, former CEO

16 17 Then & Now Sandy Road

Homes Community

“Customers are given the choice about their “I think things should be driven by people kitchens and bathrooms so they feel a part of the themselves. It’s for people who are experiencing process. Although we own the house, it’s their need to be enabled to say, ‘what do we want’? A home; they have the choice - what would they lot of good work is accomplished because people like and how would they like it laid out? That’s have come together, wanting to do something, important. We try to give the customers that bit rather than because it’s been written into the more ownership of their property. We’ll go in and business plan of an organisation. I think that’s plan it with them and the customer can see it on what community cohesion is really about”. the laptop instantly. We have a good standard of finish with our bathrooms and kitchens and the Councillor Aileen Colleran two contractors we use are extremely good, giving high levels of customer satisfaction”. John Gilbertson, Chair, Partick Works

18 19 Then & Now Beith Street, Hayburn Court Change “I’ve watched the area grow. I’ve watched it change for the better and PHA has contributed to those changes. The Partick Community Growing Project is fantastic; people have got talking to each other. It looks great and it’s had great publicity. We have some nice murals round the area because of the Commonwealth Games now as well. When we build things we do them properly. People are proud of doing things though, getting things done and getting it done right, and I think that’s what PHA’s strength is. Sometimes things will go wrong despite our best efforts because they’re outwith our control, but there’s a lot of great people in this organisation who have a passion about it”. John Gilbertson, Chair, Partick Works

The Partick Community Growing Project

20 21 “The opening was unique because I had met Ricky Ross and Lorraine McIntosh from Deacon Blue at a hotel and we asked them to come and do the opening.”

Memories It was an interesting place to come and work. The development of the co-op halls on Mansfield I can remember my first day here. I had a Street and the Peel Street new build project I started as CEO in Partick in July 1989. I was meeting at 5 o’clock about the development of spans my time here. We bought the ground for there for about five and a half years. Glasgow Harbour. There was a master plan for the Peel Street development not long after I What was interesting was that there was quite the waterfront there: leisure, hotels and retail. started. The opening was unique because I had a lot of archived material about the early years Someone had a model created of what it would met Ricky Ross and Lorraine McIntosh from of the association. It was full of people talking be like – that was 1989 – of people wind-surfing Deacon Blue at a hotel and we asked them to about how the association got started; it was on the Clyde. In those days, there was a lot come and do the opening, and we had a picture collaboration between the local churches and more money for housing associations; Partick in The Sun. That was 1994, so I would say Peel people wanting to save the area because it was was probably spending £3 - 4million per year, Street and co-op halls were my legacy”. refurbishing houses or building new ones. It was designed for comprehensive development. The Rod Hunter, former CEO whole area was going to be cleared in the late quite an active developer. Those days are gone, 60s, early 70s – Victorian Glasgow was going to for the time being anyway. be, more or less, obliterated.

22 23 Then & Now Dumbarton Road looking East

24 25 Quality “I get enjoyment out of being on the board; I enjoy when we start to talk about a project. Our last one was at Centurion Way. I remember when we first spoke about that site and then when you get round to look at the property you have a great sense of pride, because they were stunningly finished. That’s a conscious decision we made a long, long time ago. We knew that this year (2015) we have to reach the Scottish Quality Housing Standard for homes, and we were working on that and made a conscious decision that we would rather spend that wee bit more for quality because it’s going to last longer”. John Gilbertson, Chair, Partick Works

Rubbish piled up in Crawford Street in Partick during the Glasgow Dust Cart Drivers' Strike of 1975. John Byrne's gable end mural Boy on Dog was one of the first of many to be completed in the city during the 1970s.

26 27 Change “I think the organisation is far more outward- looking, I think we deliver better value for money and I think the culture of the organisation has changed significantly for the better. I’d like to think that people are very open and honest with each other in terms of working here and that there’s a much better sense of teamwork than we had before and that people are open to change, looking forward to the next chapter rather than feeling threatened by it. When I look at what’s actually been delivered, year on year, the performance indicators have improved – whether that’s collecting rents or winning awards – it was something we just didn’t go in for, but you know, there’s tangible things that people have felt the benefits from. Then there’s the visible stuff, everything from looking at the Centurion Way new- Community than 9-5 services, and we’re still on that build and celebrating just what a brilliant journey. We’re still not there at all in terms “Getting people involved is not just about development that was, through to the of social media and modernisation, but their availability, it’s about their motivation community development activity that’s out then, the news on the street is that people for engagement. If you take your average there, sponsoring school sports kits and the are still fairly traditional in Partick. A lot regeneration area, where – like here growing project. All of those things have been of people are still happy with newsletters historically – threats of demolition or so rewarding for the staff, as well as for the and to get a piece of mail, more than they the health outcomes are really poor, community, and they’ve delivered all of that. are to get a text, so it’s understanding who kids can’t get nursery places, it drives You know, the motivation has really increased we’re communicating with and why and communities together in any event. If and the results have shown for themselves. The challenging ourselves in the ways in which housing organisations harness that energy first result that we had from the new annual we engage and the methods we use. If it’s and the community drives the change, return on the charter, we beat every indicator all about meetings, who really wants to like what originally happened in Partick in Scotland, all averages, and some of them come to a meeting? What are we going to to save the tenements, then the hope is significantly. I think they’re a great team and achieve? We’ve got to be quite clever and that it will be sustainable, but it engages a great board – there’s been a lot of changes innovative about the way we engage people. people absolutely at that moment in time. on the board as well in terms of personalities If they want to sit at home, and there are At times like the referendum, there were and dynamics – but really, they understand the people that want to just press a few buttons young people engaged like never before business. on the internet and give their opinion, then because they felt so strongly about an that’s absolutely fine – they don’t have to I think we are close to the community, but I issue. In Partick, apart from strength of be in the building, talking to our staff, to still think we have a good hill to climb to really feeling of anti-student accommodation, express their view. make them feel like partners in what we’re that’s probably the only measure that I trying to do”. would look at as bounding the community In the absence of having something that together in terms of their level of interest. absolutely drives the community, a single Lynn Wassell, former CEO thing or issue, the more you understand It’s our job to recognise that, in any what they need, the more you press that event, people access information and button, if you like, the more they’ll work communication in a million different ways, with us.” which they didn’t 5/10 years ago, whether it’s social media, 24/7 services rather Lynn Wassell, former CEO

28 29 Then & Now Corner of Street and Chancellor Street

“If it wasn’t for the critical financial support and encouragement of the Housing Corporation and the Corporation of A recollection Glasgow, it could all have Ruth Henderson, Housing Manager 1976 to 1981, then Chief Executive 1995 to 2010 been so very different.”

1977, a dreich winter’s day. People rush home How did the transformation transpire? You find University who see the possibilities of combining anxious to be out of the misery. But home is no grand plan but rather disparate events and bed recesses to create an internal bathroom with misery of a different sort. A single end or one actions which, when examined in retrospect, a common vertical stack. That solution needs room and kitchen in a tenement, overcrowded resemble interlocking pieces of a giant jigsaw. everyone to take part in improving the property. more often than not; with its soot encrusted Take yourself back to January 1968, as the 103 The legislators enter the story at this crucial exterior. Sub tolerable housing they call it. No mph hurricane rips through Glasgow, tearing off stage, passing the Housing Scotland Act of hot water, no bathroom or in some cases inside roofs and chimneys crashing through buildings; 1974, defining housing action areas within toilet, wiring so old that it is dangerous to life, callous underinvestment rendering Glasgow’s which owners are obliged to improve their leaky roofs, stairs worn down by years of weary decrepit tenement housing unfit. Watch in houses with the help of more generous grants, feet dragging themselves home after a day in the days and weeks ahead as a sea of green with subsidies for housing associations. Applaud the shipyards perhaps, or some other heavy tarpaulins, covering up holes in roofs across the the 7 member steering group of Partick Housing industry. No escape into a warm bath but boiled city, flutter above you. Look across the river to Association, some warriors from the New Partick kettles, water drawn from the jaw box, tin bath in Govan, in the midst of this chaos, the formation Society, who encouraged and emboldened by front of the fire or range, or a trip to the public of the New Govan Society, which was to become what is happening in Govan, have the vision, baths. Rent £80 a year; repairs minimal. Owner Govan Housing Association, goes largely commitment and courage to move forwards occupation by deposit and instalment-yours unnoticed, while the Clydeside expressway tears to the crucial registration of Partick Housing today but never yours till the last penny paid. through the heart of the south of Dumbarton Association in October 1975. Road. However, were you to lift your eyes from the Activists press for the creation of Meadowside pavement you would see the honey sandstone The following year, the 1969 Housing (Scotland) and Thornwood Housing Association in 1977. of 15 White Street shining out of the gloom, a Act was passed. Public participation into If it wasn’t for the critical financial support and beacon of what might be done. Inside the close the planning process is the big idea, while encouragement of the Housing Corporation and mouth, admire the Veitchi flooring and speckled redevelopment plans for Partick are still of great the Corporation of Glasgow, it could all have walls, smell the paint, wander into a flat, the concern. been so very different. fitted kitchen, hot water on tap, the bathroom, 1971 saw the introduction the New Partick in place of the two bed recesses. Walk through 2015, four decades on, you might walk over Society, standing up for Partick, challenging on the spring of newly fitted carpets; admire the that familiar ground and your eyes might glance wholescale redevelopment. Acknowledge the new curtains and blinds; peoples’ palaces. When fleetingly at the sign at 10 Mansfield Street, false starts to tenement improvement taking you’re leaving, you notice that three are now Partick Works Ltd, it announces. You might reflect place elsewhere in the city, bits of the jigsaw two. The middle flat is missing. Amalgamation it momentarily and say to yourself quietly, ‘Yes I evolving but still misshapen. Recognise the is called. Homes fit for the 20th Century. guess it does’ innovation of the architects at

30 31 “A lot of good work is accomplished because people have come together.”

Interviewer: Ryan Kyle Editor: Mark Hughes