Charing Cross

** 200^th review! **
It feels very weird reviewing what it basically a motorway junction on Unilocal,but hey — who am I to complain?
The best way to appreciate this area is from the centre of the pedestrian bridge that links the bottom end of Renfrew Street with Woodside Crescent and Woodlands Road. From here you get pretty good views of the whole area.
As you can see, the motorway swoops through in an underpass, leaving a complicated web of access roads on the surface, as anyone who has attempted to drive from the southbound M8 to Woodlands Road will attest!
The motorway construction was very controversial back in the 1960s as whole swathes of typical Glasgow Victorian buildings were demolished to create this motorway corridor that now basically cuts off the city centre from the West End. But we should consider ourselves fortunate, as this is one of the few parts of the accursed ‘Bruce Report’ that actually materialised. The Bruce Plan recommended that the entire city centre be demolished and replaced with a sterile Bauhaus-​inspired collection of faceless concrete tower blocks with wide boulevards — (rather like Milton Keynes actually). Many of Glasgow’s architectural gems would have gone, including Mackintosh’s School of Art, the City Chambers, the Art Gallery and Museum, even Central Station.
Thankfully the destruction at Charing Cross and Anderston caused by the motorway elicited such outcry from Glasgow folk that the rest of the city centre plan was quietly dropped, including the eastern leg of the motorway ring road that was to have been built down the High Street, and would have required the demolition of the medieval heart of the city and some of its oldest buildings.
Looking south from our viewpoint, we can see spanning the motorway a rather odd-​looking bridge with an office block on top. Originally this was to have been part of a high-​level shopping walkway that would have extended right along Sauchiehall Street had the Bruce Plan gone ahead, with the required demolition of all those buildings. It sat as a bare concrete platform for many years before the office ‘wing’ was built in a desperate attempt to give it some purpose.
Some of the other concrete monstrosities in the city arose as a direct result of the Bruce Plan; places like the Sauchiehall Street Centre, Empire House, and the infamous Red Road flats.
To the left as we look south, the curve of the buildings sweeping round into Sauchiehall Street is Charing Cross Mansions, a wonderful façade that fortunately escaped the axe and now marks the start of Sauchiehall Street’s shopping area. To the right is a hideous brutalist office block that replaced the Charing Cross Grand Hotel. It’s worth taking a stroll down past this building to see the famous and quirky ‘leaning fountain’, erected in1896 in honour of Sir Charles Cameron, the newspaper owner-​editor and Liberal politician. It’s been leaning for quite some time now and seems quite happy about it.
Turning now to the north, you are greeted with the sight of the splendid St. George’s Mansions at the corner of Woodlands Road and St. George’s Road. The large ground floor of this building has been inhabited by several short-​lived businesses over the years — I put it down to the bad feng-​shui — but the current occupiers The Chocolate Factory have been there for quite a while so they must be doing something right!
The motorway curves around the back of Garnethill towards Port Dundas, but the view continues northwards towards the high flats of Possilpark and Springburn and a glimpse of the Campsie Hills beyond.