Plans for University Avenue
Published: 15 February 2019
Ann Allen, Executive Director of Estates & Commercial Services, discusses plans for University Avenue
As mentioned in last week’s newsletter, from 4 March, the University will begin work to make University Avenue a safer and more useable environment.
These changes are important to ensure our students staff and residents can continue to use the Avenue safely.
It is important that this work is undertaken in time to accommodate the higher footfalls that will follow with the opening of the new learning and teaching hub; the first project to be completed in our £1 billion campus development. As part of our capital investment programme, we are also committed to place making and improving the look and feel of the urban realm.
We want to make sure that we take this opportunity to create a safe and welcoming environment for everyone, and balance the requirements of pedestrians, cyclists, users of public transport and drivers of vehicles.
The first stage of these plans is to build two new wider pedestrians crossings - often referred to a “super crossings”. These are wider crossing points, which means larger numbers of pedestrians can cross at any one time, but still support the flow of cycles and cars through the Avenue.
They will better manage significant pedestrian flows, keeping people safer. Later in the programme, we will resurface the road and footpaths, install better street lighting, install bespoke street furniture and plant more trees.
You can find out more about our plans for University Avenue on our website.
In developing our Campus Development Framework and Masterplan, which set the overall place-making vision, we latterly undertook a period of public consultation and detailed discussion with Glasgow City Council and other key stakeholders. We also identified a number of measures which will make the Avenue safer for cyclists.
When we resurface the road, we will formalise 1.5 meter wide cycle lanes on the uphill portions of the road, better delineating them with solid lines and coloured surfacing. We believe that these measures, together with the removal of on-street parking and the reduction of the speed limit on the Avenue to 20mph, will make optimum use of the limited space available.
As part of our sustainability and wellbeing plans, we are keen to encourage cycling and are investing heavily in cycle parking on the campus.
We did consider options for segregating the cycle lanes and providing full-length cycle lanes on both sides of the road as part of our development process. However, we concluded that there is not enough space to provide segregated cycle lanes as well as footpaths and bus stops which are wide enough to safely accommodate the number of pedestrians this area will receive. We appreciate that some cycling lobby groups would want us to do more for cyclists, and we appreciate their views. We can however only do this at the expense of the pavement and keeping our pedestrians safe.
As you will appreciate as this is a major route for pedestrian movement of our 35,000 staff and students and, where we sadly experienced a fatality in 2018, we are keen to ensure safe movement of pedestrians.
We will continue to engage with all parties during the construction delivery of the works on University Avenue in order to achieve a significant improvement to current conditions for everyone.
Regards,
Ann Allen
Executive Director of Estates & Commercial Services
University of Glasgow
First published: 15 February 2019