“BEECHING’S Blitz!” ran the front-page headline in the Evening Times of March 27, 1963, reporting that 51 Scottish railway services were to be withdrawn and 435 Scottish stations closed under the terms of a report by Dr Richard Beeching, chairman of the British Railways Board. (The Glasgow Herald, the following day, had the altogether more sober “Revolution in British Railway System.”)
Glasgow’s Lord Provost, Jean Roberts, expressed dismay that Glasgow could lose two mainline stations, Buchanan Street and St Enoch.
Bridgeton Cross station (above) was one of these earmarked for closure. It shut in October 1964. The photograph appeared in the Evening Times in March, 1977, some two months before the station was due to be demolished.
This time, however, there was some positive rail-related news to report. “The barometer of progress to super trans-city travel is there for all to see - three-quarters of a mile of white concrete and rail has snaked its way from Rutherglen to Dalmarnock,” the report began.
The Clyderail scheme, which was designed to enable commuters to travel north and south of the Clyde with ease, was well on schedule, and the signs were that it would open in May 1979. The line, the paper added, would run from Partick to Central Station, to the new underground Argyle station and out through Bridgeton, Dalmarnock, and south of the river to Rutherglen.
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