Milngavie


Milngavie is a town in East Dunbartonshire, Scotland and a suburb of Glasgow. It is on the Allander Water, at the northwestern edge of Greater Glasgow, and about from Glasgow city centre. It neighbours Bearsden. Milngavie is a commuter town, with much of its working population travelling to Glasgow to work or study. The town is served by Milngavie railway station on the North Clyde Line of the SPT rail network, which links it to Central Glasgow. The town was formerly served by routes 13 and 14 of the once extensive Glasgow tramway system. Tramway services in Milngavie were withdrawn in 1956; the entire system was dismantled by September 1962.
The town is a very popular retirement location, with an unusually high proportion of elderly. In 2018 the Scottish Government published statistics for the town showing that the population increased to 13,537 in 6,062 households.
The Milngavie and Bearsden Herald, owned by Johnston Press, is a weekly newspaper that covers local events from the schools, town halls, community and government in the area. The paper was established in 1901 and is printed every Wednesday, to be sold on Thursdays.
Currently the town is perhaps best known as the start of the West Highland Way long distance footpath which runs northwards for to the town of Fort William. A granite obelisk in the town centre marks the official starting point of the footpath.

History

The apparent mismatch between the town's written and pronounced names stems from the way its Gaelic name was adapted into English. The Gaelic name for the town is conjectured to have been Muileann Dhaibhidh, with Daibhidh shortened to Dàidh in common speech, yielding Muileann Dhàidh. The former may thus account for the spelling "-gavie", the latter for the pronunciation "-guy". The stress placement is Gaelic, too, but the first part of the name may have been influenced by its Scots/English counterpart in both pronunciation and spelling, not just reduced; cf. Kirkcudbright.
There are many Scots names for the town. In fact, even within single texts such as the Records of the Parliament of Scotland, different variants are used alongside each other. Joan Blaeu's Atlas of Scotland shows some Scots spellings for well-known places which indicate some of their origins: Milngavie is shown as Milgay, possibly meaning "Mill of Guy". An alternative suggestion is that the original translation meant "Gavin's Mill", and indeed Gavin's Mill remains in the town centre to this day. The most recently published name is Mulguy, although the author admits that while academically researched, some entries in his work on place names may be controversial.
Although known today as a dormitory suburb of Glasgow, the town grew from a country village within the parish of New Kilpatrick to a minor industrial centre in the nineteenth century with paper mills and bleach works on the Allander River to the north west of the town centre. Some remnants of this industry remain today on the Cloberfield Industrial Estate.
The land surrounding the village comprised several estates with tenant farms, amongst them Barloch, Clober, Craigton, Craigdhu, Dougalston, Douglas Mains and South Mains.
Stone-built villas and semi-detached houses were constructed for wealthy citizens to the east of the town centre and around Tannoch Loch when commuting to Glasgow was made possible by the opening of the railway which reached the town in 1863.
After World War II a local authority housing scheme was built to the west of the town centre, housing many people relocated from Clydebank which had been badly bombed. The town grew with the addition of private speculative housing developments of bungalows and semi-detached homes at South Mains to the south of the town centre and around Clober, to the west, in the 1950s and 1960s. The Fairways estate was built, starting in 1978 and continued into the 1980s.
The town centre was redeveloped to improve traffic flow and pedestrian safety. The central commercial streets were pedestrianised starting in 1974 and many buildings replaced. A superstore was opened on the fringes of the town centre in the 1990s.
Residents launched a "tongue in cheek" campaign to bring the Olympic games to Milngavie in 2020.

Governance

Milngavie, originally in Stirlingshire, was in an area that became an exclave of Dunbartonshire on the orders of King David II. In 1875, whilst remaining part of Dunbartonshire, it became a police burgh under the jurisdiction of the Stirlingshire constabulary and retained burgh status for 100 years until 1975 when it was absorbed into the newly created Strathclyde Region.
Milngavie is located to the north of the neighbouring town of Bearsden. Although the two are in close proximity, the social histories of these two towns differ significantly. Bearsden grew almost exclusively as a dormitory town of Glasgow for the wealthy and professional classes. In that sense both towns now fulfil a similar role. The two became a single local authority district in 1975, before Scottish Local Government reorganisation in the 1990s re-integrated them with Kirkintilloch and Bishopbriggs to form the East Dunbartonshire administrative area, although transport and social networks link the town much more closely with Glasgow itself.

Landmarks

Little remains of the pre-nineteenth century village other than the Corbie Ha' meeting hall, Cross Keys Public House, although now renovated and re-named, and the Gavin's Mill water mill on the Allander Water along with Barloch House and Barloch Farm.
There are a few good examples of nineteenth century stone villas along the Station Road as well as the well preserved nineteenth century railway station. Many interesting Victorian houses around the Tannoch Conservation Area show Scottish cottage, Scottish Baronial, Classical architecture and Gothic influences. The town centre and Strathblane Road have remaining Victorian shop/tenement buildings and a few Arts and crafts influenced commercial buildings. Craigmillar Avenue and the area around Baldernock Road have some large Arts and Crafts and Glasgow Style influenced houses.
The bulk of the housing stock is twentieth century, showing Scottish vernacular influences such as harling or rough-casting, and, occasionally, more traditionally English elements like black and white timber paneled dormer windows and gables.
The public sheltered housing projects of the 1970s and 1980s are interesting for their attempts to use traditional local materials like grey rough-cast and slate plus interesting rounded walls and pitched roofs.
The most recent development is characterised by some interesting one-off conversions and extensions to Victorian properties; new housing by developers that often follows designs based on the brick architecture of the South of England; and contemporary steel framed commercial and leisure buildings.
The Milngavie reservoir is visited by tourists and walkers. The reservoir is made up of the Craigmaddie and Mugdock reservoirs and was opened in 1859 by Queen Victoria. It is the main supplier of water to the city of Glasgow and can hold up to of water.
The war memorial is by George Henry Paulin.
The Auld Wives' Lifts, an interesting natural rock feature, is located on Craigmaddie Muir to the north east of Milngavie.

Education

Secondary schools

State funded:
Privately funded:
Originally Milngavie was in the Parish of New Kilpatrick, the church being that of New Kilpatrick in Bearsden, with no formal place of worship in the town until the eighteenth century.
Milngavie has three stone built churches dating from the early twentieth century within 500 m of each other. Up until the 1970s these three were all Church of Scotland congregations: St.Paul's, Cairns, and St.Luke's. This came about due to the history of the Kirk which saw a multitude of factions and congregations organise, each with varying forms of worship and constitutional arrangements, which subsequently re-integrated. St.Paul's was always in the fold of the Church of Scotland and is the parish church of Milngavie. It was originally housed in a simple grey stone church building above the Station Road beside the Milngavie Primary School before moving to a handsome red sandstone building on the Strathblane Road in 1906. The original building is now apartments. Since 1799 Cairns Church had been located in a building on Mugdock Road close to the 'preaching braes' on Barloch Moor where the congregation's first services had taken place. It moved to its present building on Buchanan Street in 1903 which displays elements of the Glasgow Style of architecture and design. St.Luke's had been built as the Milngavie United Free Church. In the 1970s it was decided that the concentration of churches in one area should be reviewed and a new St. Lukes was built on the western side of the town to serve the residents of Clober. The Roman Catholic Church bought the old St.Luke's Church and moved their congregation to the new premises from a church on Buchanan Street at Moor Road which was associated with the neighbouring Roman Catholic Convent of Ladywood which closed in the 1970s.

Sporting institutions

has their professional training facility, The Rangers Training Centre, at Auchenhowie Road in the east of the town. It was officially opened on 4 July 2001 by then-manager Dick Advocaat and then-chairman David Murray, after whom it was originally named as Murray Park. The total cost of the complex was estimated at £14 million. Following improvements completed in 2019, the facility became the regular home venue for competitive matches played by Rangers' Women's team, Reserve team and Under 18's team as well as many younger age groups. On 2 August 2019 the new Academy Stand with an all-seated capacity of 250 was officially opened at The Rangers Training Centre before hosting a reserve friendly against Chelsea F.C. finishing in a 1-1 draw.
Milngavie is the base of West of Scotland F.C., a rugby club, which dates from 1865 and is one of the founder members of the SRU. They were one of the first open rugby clubs in Scotland, i.e. not affiliated to any school.
Due to the town's suburban and residential profile, it is home to many sporting clubs and facilities.
The playwright Robert McLellan grew up in the town where his father, John, founded and ran the local Allander Press, with premises in the Black Bull Yard from c.1912.
The footballer Murdo MacLeod, who played for Dumbarton, Celtic, Borussia Dortmund and Hibernian, and at international level for Scotland, was born and brought up in Milngavie.
Tom Hoy, Krysia Kocjan and Robin Thyne Recording artists with the Natural Acoustic Band 1969-1974
Two albums on the RCA label Learning to Live and Branching In. Tom and Robin later Joined international folk rock band Magna Carta
The former Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson was born and brought up in Milngavie. She attended local school Douglas Academy. She is the former Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Employment relations, consumer and postal affairs, having lost her seat in the 2015 General Election, only to regain it in 2017. She then lost her seat in 2019, resulting in Jo stepping down as leader for the Liberal Democrat Party.
Prof Edward Eisner FRSE of the University of Strathclyde lived in Milngavie.
Racing driver Gerry Birrell was born and raised in Milngavie before moving south to London as he became more successful.
Margaret Cunnison was a Scottish aviator and the first Scottish woman flying instructor. She was one of the first women to join the Air Transport Auxiliary.