Glasgow Blind Asylum

[The Egg Man]

It seems a bit unlikely that Greater Glasgow/ Clyde Health Board would use, no offence intended, a wee backstreet estate agent to sell a chunk of property like this, with viewing via Choice Properties, Knockentiber.

[panthro]

See I was thinking that as well. Although NHSGGC need to find about £40million in savings this year, I doubt they would use a less professional ('West End") estate agent especially one outwith Glasgow and Clyde. That would seem to point to the Clocktower being in private hands. Also, it would appear that there was every intention of redevloping the site but IMO looks like the money has dried up. Reasons being: "The majority of the windows have been fitted" and "The property is mostly Gyprocked out although there are no internal partitions."

[RDR]

See I was thinking that as well. Although NHSGGC need to find about £40million in savings this year, I doubt they would use a less professional ('West End") estate agent especially one outwith Glasgow and Clyde. That would seem to point to the Clocktower being in private hands. Also, it would appear that there was every intention of redevloping the site but IMO looks like the money has dried up. Reasons being: "The majority of the windows have been fitted" and "The property is mostly Gyprocked out although there are no internal partitions."

Just to worry you more its 52 million they need to find this year.

I think it was probably sold off cheap when they finally realised they couldn't do anything with it and it was going to cost a small fortune to keep it standing. You may remember the old St Mungo building, where the new plastics OP is now collapsed unexpextedly, I think prior to 2003. I suspect that made them decide to get shot of the clocktower after GCC had a right go at them about the St Mungo.

Genuinely GCC insisted that the car park when being designed had to blend with the clocktower at one end and the new Jubilee building at the other an almost impossible task.

[panthro]

Just to worry you more its 52 million they need to find this year.

Shows how much attention I pay. That was a few months ago mind. However, this board paper from June seems to suggest it is actually £57m or around 3% of budget. Of course we are now into August and could be hitting £60m!

You may remember the old St Mungo building, where the new plastics OP is now collapsed unexpextedly, I think prior to 2003. I suspect that made them decide to get shot of the clocktower after GCC had a right go at them about the St Mungo.

Before my time unfortunately! I started at GRI in 2007. So was this collapsed building part of the current St Mungo? Was it bigger than it is the now. Ironically, my post above re: ripping out recently refurbished offices was actually about the St Mungo Building. Now figures aren't my strong point but was told that it cost £250,000 to transform the old haemato-oncology (wards 41/42?) into offices. Then it cost much the same to turn it back into a ward for Stobhhill moving over. Also rumours have it that it isn't working well as an acute inpatient ward at the minute with the staff being moved on a frequent basis when they close it.

Genuinely GCC insisted that the car park when being designed had to blend with the clocktower at one end and the new Jubilee building at the other an almost impossible task.

Back on topic (sorry Mods!). Well how does that work?! Having a look at streetview shows a glass covered stairwell butting right up to the Clocktower (this is the door we used to jam open with a traffic cone running over to the Vineyard!). Now this isn't exactly the Louvre by mixing modern with old! And I don't get how it matches in with the Jubilee which is silver in colour and the car park a beige stone? Am I being thick or did the planning folk just agree to it realising it was nigh on impossible to have a half and half car park?!?

[RDR]

Ah you're just a youngster!
I worked at GRI late 70's and then later between '98 & 2003. My wife still works there.

I can remember when the present car park was wards 40/41 Urology and when they were demolished for phase 1 or the QEB as you will know it, then it being a bit of waste ground for parking (used to park there).

Of course the finshed multistory looks nothing like the original drawings that were produced and for which planning permission was granted. I'll presume the finished article ended up being different and the GCC agreeing to those adjustments. I knew the guy who was involved from the HB side in a lot of it so asked him about it from time to time. Originally the car park had famous medical names on the side of it as a link to the GRI of the past, but I think they were vandalised. You'll see some of the names, they reproduced, in bronze plaques in the old centre block entrance and at the bottom of the stairwell of the Walton Building, which of course was the Nurses Home in a past life.

You are talking about the new St Mungo. The original was where plastics OP is now and a remnant of it has been restored between the gate of mortuary avenue and the small gate which is at the end of the walkway from the newer St Mungo. That gate is very handy for the vineyard.

The derilict St Mungo, before it fell down, was distinguished by the tree which grew up through the middle of it and had a population of jakies living in it. It was once the burns unit I think. When it collapsed all the wards and theatres (24,33,36) opposite in that block had to be closed for the weekend until it was made safe. Got me a lot of OT helping transfer equipment and people to the other side of the hospital. Ward 24 at that time, ironically was the Burns Unit, thought that's now in the new Jubilee Building.

[robertpool]

a couple of items from my collection

Advertisment from 1870


Letter from 1958

[HollowHorn]

Was up there yesterday & was rather astonished to see that the Asylum has eventually been transformed into 'The Clocktower Cafe" & attached flats:



Couple of 'poor' interior shots:




Very pleasant cafe, give it a try.

PS. Looks like it was a commercial enterprise in the past too, shop can be clearly seen:

Costs were covered by subscriptions, donations, bequests and the sale of articles such as brushes, baskets and bedding manufactured in the workshops.

[RapidAssistant]

Pity about the hideous multi-storey car park next door..... (and don't get me started on GRI parking charges!)

[RDR]

Pity about the hideous multi-storey car park next door..... (and don't get me started on GRI parking charges!)

Yes and to think the builders were told to make it blend with the older buildings.
Someone at GGC planning obviously had a very strange idea of what might blend in.

[Fat Cat]

That cafe is overpriced and not very good.

[RapidAssistant]

That cafe is overpriced and not very good.

You can get away with charging high prices in the town, but the only footfall here is from the hospital, which is hardly a destination most people go to by choice - especially when the Royal's own tearooms are quite reasonably priced in comparison.

[panthro]

Saw the Clock Tower is back surrounded by scaffolding. Something gone wrong?

[DavidMcD316]

great name for a rock band.
Glasgow Blind Asylum

[Josef]

That cafe is overpriced and not very good.

You can get away with charging high prices in the town, but the only footfall here is from the hospital, which is hardly a destination most people go to by choice

I've always wondered whether the folk who planned the ring road didn't even think of what effect the motorway ring would have on people that previously lived In Glasgow but would now be outwith the - effectively - city walls, whether they did but idealistically thought it would have little effect, tried to ameliorate the effect (thus the drawings of people playing chess and having picnics under the flyovers in the original plans) or simply didn't give a bollocks.

[RapidAssistant]

That cafe is overpriced and not very good.

You can get away with charging high prices in the town, but the only footfall here is from the hospital, which is hardly a destination most people go to by choice

I've always wondered whether the folk who planned the ring road didn't even think of what effect the motorway ring would have on people that previously lived In Glasgow but would now be outwith the - effectively - city walls, whether they did but idealistically thought it would have little effect, tried to ameliorate the effect (thus the drawings of people playing chess and having picnics under the flyovers in the original plans) or simply didn't give a bollocks.

I think it was all a big well meaning, utopian vision that failed. You only have to look at the big trench that they drove through the middle of Charing Cross and how the motorway creates a psychological barrier between the city centre and the west end, so see what potentially could have also happened at Castle Street and the Cathedral area.

Although on the "didn't give a bollocks" viewpoint, I think that's true generally as well when planners were implementing their vision. I'm reading a book right now on how the World Trade Center was built in New York back in the 1960s, and how the store owners on the streets where Ground Zero is now were simply evicted from their premises with the US equivalent of a compulsory purchase order and swept away, although many had been family businesses that had been there for generations.