The Sighthill footbridge and the construction of gantry signs (1971)
The development of Glasgow taking place in the 1960s and 70s imagined a future in which roads would be a key way of connecting communities and cars would serve people’s transport needs. However, new roads and developments also sometimes worked around existing street layouts – for example building elevated sections of motorway to retain the streets below - and looked to find ways to maintain access between different areas of the city. The footbridge from Sighthill to North Wallace Street was intended to allow access on foot between Sighthill and the city centre. This bridge was the framing device for a photograph taken by shop steward Frank O’Neill in May 1978 of Duncan Lunan and John Braithwaite pointing out the site of the soon-to-be constructed Sighthill stone circle on the ridge to the north behind them. (This appears in Lunan’s book The stones and the stars as Figure 5.17.) On 5th August 2001, Firsat Dag, a Kurdish asylum seeker, was chased across this bridge and stabbed to death in Sighthill Park. Demolished in 2020, the bridge in this picture was replaced with a new footbridge in 2021, renewing access between Sighthill and the city centre. There is a campaign to name the new bridge after Firsat Dag.