Glasgow 2014: delivering a gold-standard legacy one year on?

The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) World Swimming Championships will take place from tomorrow in Tollcross Aquatic Centre, which was upgraded to become a key venue at the Commonwealth Games. The IPC organisers say a key reason Glasgow was chosen was because the city has an "obvious passion for sport" - as demonstrated by the Games.

It is just one example of a continuing boost from Glasgow 2014. From the beginning, organisers pledged that creating a legacy would be at the heart of the event, which cost £543 million to stage - including £424.5m of public money. The ambitious targets ranged from getting the nation to become more physically active and encouraging tourism to boosting the economy and Scotland's international reputation.

A key focus has been the regeneration of the city's east end - long blighted by deprivation - where much of the Games took place. Today the Athlete's Village - once temporarily home to sporting superstars such as Usain Bolt - is now housing an influx of new residents to Dalmarnock.

It still feels like a work in progress, with areas where metal fencing is in place and construction of a new 37-acre woodland park on once derelict-land taking place. But there is a quiet, relaxed air to the village, with children cycling about the streets - a far cry from the bustle of hosting thousands of international athletes.

Billy Redmond, 62, is a community campaigner who has lived in the area all his life, and stays opposite the village. He recounts memories of forty years ago, before Dalmarnock fell into decay and dereliction, when it was a thriving community, with dozens of shops such as bakers and fishmongers.

He says it has been a "long hard struggle" to get the improvements to the area, which fell into decay following the sharp decline of traditional industries, but believes the disruption of years of construction work has been worthwhile.

Redmond said: "It has been worth it to get the improvements in the end - although you never take everyone with you. There's always a certain amount of people who will not go along with it, even if it is to better your house or your area."

In the shadow of the huge bulk of the Emirates Arena - one of the sporting venues built for the Commonwealth Games - is another new facility which it is hoped will have a lasting impact on the community of Dalmarnock. The Legacy Hub was built to replace the area's former community centre, which was flattened as part of the regeneration plans. A replacement was one of the top priorities cited by local people when asked about what they wanted to see as a result of the Games.

At the moment, the £3.7m facility - which will create around 60 new jobs - is empty, with freshly laid carpets and newly painted walls. But the rooms will soon be filled a pharmacy, two GP practices, a dental surgery, cafe, nursery school, theatre and training suite.

Yvonne Kucuk, a local Labour councillor who set up the People's Development Trust to ensure locals had their say in the regeneration plans, believes the centre will provide one of the most important legacies for the community.

She said: "Whether you are coming here for child care, to do arts and drama or to help with allotment for example, everything will have learning attached to it.

"When the mums drop their kids off at nursery we can say to them come in and see what we are doing here, get involved and volunteer.

"A lot of people also don't have the confidence to walk through the door of a job centre - here they can come in, build a relationship with us, get the confidence to say I am going to do this course.

"And we can offer a peer programme where if they are studying they can meet together and share books."

Kuckuk added: "With the new community that has arrived (in the village), we have had enquiries about bookings every day, for events such as weddings and birthday parties.

"People wanted a sense of community back, a replacement for their much loved-community centre.

"Until this year it has all been hypothetical - now the reality is here and we are just weeks from moving in.

"This is beyond 2014 - it is about the lives that will change. Okay, it was tough - there was dust and debris for eight years and we couldn't get moving during the Games themselves - but look at the place now."

However, research has suggested there is still far to go when it comes to a legacy for the wider east end. A study being carried out by researchers at Glasgow University is for the first time trying to assess how the local community has been impacted by a major sporting event, rather than the host city or country. Residents were surveyed on a number of issues before and after the Games, and the exercise will be repeated in summer next year to build attempt to find out what has changed.

The initial findings suggest a mixed picture. The vast majority of local residents felt the inconvenience of the Games was worth it and one in 20 households gained some sort of employment as a result of the sporting event. But while more residents rated local sports facilities as "very good" - with an increase from 19 per cent before the Games to 36 per cent last year, the number of people using these sporting facilities or meeting recommended levels of physical activity declined.

Ade Kearns, professor of urban studies at Glasgow University and leader of the Go Well project, said shifting attitudes towards exercise was always challenging and it was unrealistic to expect a large rise.

But he said community hubs - such as the one about to be opened in Dalmarnock - could be used to try to encourage people to take part in simple activities such as walking.

"What we find is there is a small effect from the Games in inspiring people to do new or more sport, but it is less than 10 per cent," he said. "And they are mostly people who are already playing sport.

"It could well be that people are not inspired by elite athletes as they don't equate it with what they can do.

"The new community venues are hubs which could be used to get the idea of doing more physical activity across to people, rather than sports venues."

Kearns also said it remained to be seen whether the benefit of extra local employment around the Games - would be translated into better long-term employment prospects. He pointed out that eight years of regeneration has so far brought around 1,800-2,000 jobs into the area - around 40 per cent of the target.

He said: "If you want to retain some of those people who are going to get jobs or come with their firms that relocate to the area, you want them to be spending money in the area.

"But they are not going to do that unless you provide the sort of places they want to spend money in and at the moment - and one of the areas which hasn't been improved very much to date is the consumption or retail environment."

He added: "There is a high chance the venues in the east end will be used, as Glasgow has a very good track record in booking events into the city. They won't be white elephants.

"But the question for our study in the east end is if you book an international sports event into the Emirates arena will any of those hundreds of thousands of athletes spend any money in the east end?

"There will be a boost to the city economy no doubt, and any boost to the city economy will have a partial ripple effect upon the east end. "But a bigger effect would be if any of them stayed in the east end - and so far they haven't delivered new hotel accommodation into the area, so that has reduced the spend locally.

"There is still more work to be done to make sure the east end gets some of those secondary economic benefits from what I think will be a reasonably successful events schedule."

He added: "The Games is supposed to have a legacy for the nation, for the city of Glasgow and for the east end - and balancing all those things is not easy."

There is a raft of examples to demonstrate the wider benefits the Games has brought to Glasgow and Scotland. In the past four years, there has been an increase over more than 21,000 - 11 % - in club memberships of sports which were featured in the Commonwealth Games.

Almost 6,000 Glaswegians aged between 18-24 years old have benefited from a Commonwealth Games apprenticeship scheme, while Scottish firms won over £520million of Games-related contracts.

The Games have also helped secure 45 high profile events for the country - such as the IPC World Swimming Championships - worth an estimated £18.5 million. And a dedicated £9 million para-sports facility - the first in Scotland and in the UK - is being built in Largs.

Professor Grant Jarvie, head of Edinburgh University's Academy of Sport, said hosting the Commonwealth Games had undoubtedly helped to boost Glasgow and Scotland's international profile, both in terms of sport and cultural relations.

"Scotland doesn't have any foreign embassies, so therefore these events are really important in terms of raising the cultural profile, image and winning friends for Scotland," he said.

"Glasgow 2014 created a window of opportunity to create influence in sport and through sport.

"Scotland and Glasgow took that opportunity - but the challenge now is how to build and sustain that."