Old Glasgow Club

Minutes of ordinary meeting of Club held at Adelaide’s, 209 Bath Street on Thursday 12 November 2009 at 7.30pm

Attendance

105

Chair

Mr Gordon (President)

Welcome

Mr Gordon welcomed members to the meeting.

Apologies

There were apologies from  Anna Forrest, Joyce McNae, Esther Connelly, Sharon Macey and Jennifer McTavish.

 Minutes

The minutes of the last ordinary meeting held on 10 September were approved, proposed by Mr Little and seconded by Mrs Thom. There were no matters arising.

President’s report

Mr Gordon reported that the October meeting had been a good one.

Secretary’s report

Mrs McNae submitted a written report. Those going on the BBC tour on 28 November should collect their tickets; panto tickets for 17 December were still available; copies of the Glasgow Gospel and aroma soaps were on sale.  Members were reminded about the Members’ Night on 14 January.

Speaker

Mr Gordon introduced Gavin McLellan, the Development Director of the Glasgow Riverside Museum, who was replacing his former colleague Iyke Ikegwuonu, who had returned to Nigeria to take over the family oil industry business.

The Riverside museum is to be the new location for the Transport Museum. The new museum would not just be about who made the trams, but about who travelled in them.  The museum was the latest in a line of regeneration programmes over the last 20 years, starting with the Burrell Collection in 1983, followed by the Garden Festival in 1988, the Year of Culture in 1990, the Concert Hall in 1992 and the Glasgow Museum of Modern Art in 1996.

At present the Transport Museum has over 500,000 visitors per year and is the second most popular museum in the UK (after the York transport Museum), and the third most popular free attraction in Scotland.  The current museum has been in the Kelvin Hall since 1988. Kelvin Hall was not purpose built for the transport collections and the collection is suffering.  Nor can the whole collection be shown. The new museum will double the size of what can be shown, from 1,400 to 3,000 objects.

The designer is the renowned Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid. The museum will be column  free, shaped like a bend in the river, thus offering a sense of movement.  The collection will be changed 8 times per year.    The museum will be sited at Pointhouse Quay, the confluence of the Clyde and the Kelvin (and where the paddle steamer Waverley was constructed); the Tall Ship will be berthed nearby and the Kelvin Harbour will attract new boat traffic.

Kelvin Hall is very compartmentalised; the new museum will mixed. There will be reproduction streets from the 1900s, 1920s-30s and 1960s-80s, with live interpretation ie people dressed up. The model ships will remain, all 788 of them, carried past on a conveyor belt.  Key attractions will include the car wall with 778 cars, ship launch show and steam workings.

Topping out took place in June 2009, and the Museum will be complete in August 2010, opening in spring 2011.

The cost will be £74m, of which Glasgow City Council is producing £69m (including £18m from the Heritage Lottery Fund).  Large donations have come from HBOS and Diageo.  There will be an Events Square, at the front of the building, with a panorama looking East.  Transport links will include a fast launch from the Broomielaw, Partick Station, a bridge being built across the river and a link to Kelvingrove Museum.  The existing museum will close in Spring 2010.  Tours will be available. Mr McLellan had brought publicity leaflets with him and encouraged members to take them away.

In answer to many questions posed, Mr McLellan stated that there would be an exhibition about Lockerbie, that the current museum would possibly become a Community Sports centre, and would be used to house boxing for the Commonwealth Games in 2014, that transport links would be good and that there would be quiet spaces for families who wished to picnic.

Vote of thanks

Mr Graeme Smith proposed the vote of thanks. Members had greatly appreciated Mr McLellan’s enthusiastic talk and wished the development well. We looked forward to the opening in 2011.

Competition winner

The competition was to guess the length of the Clyde.  Answer 106 miles.  The winner was Jane Collie.

AOCB

Mr Gordon asked Mr McNae to pass on our good wishes to Joyce, who was unable to be present tonight, and read out a letter from Anna Forrest, still working abroad in Cyprus, complementing the club on a good programme for the session.

The next directors’ meeting would be on 3 December and the next ordinary meeting on 10 December, on the subject of Glickmans confectionery shop.

Close

Mr Gordon wished all a safe journey home.

JN Gibson

Joint Recording Secretary