Then & Now Dumbarton Road, Peel Street Corner
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Then & Now Dumbarton Road, Peel Street Corner 4 5 Partick 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 Glasgow, 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 Scotland 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 Govanhill, Partick and Shettleston. 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 Drumchapel”, 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 Govan 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 Billy Connolly'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’.