Cumbernauld

Cumbernauld is a new town in Scotland to the NE of Glasgow. It was started in the 1950s to provide overspill and slum clearance opportunities in Glasgow, and whilst it has never reached its planned size, it is a large town lying astride the M80 motorway, so offering good links to Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling and further afield. The town was built around two villages in the first instance, although numerous small settlements have also been absorbed by the urban area. In addition to the town centre area, there are large housing estates and a number of industrial areas, providing many jobs. Some of these are related more to distribution than manufacturing, but there are also a number of factories and small workshops in the town.

The town was laid out in an idealistic pedestrians over (or under) cars, where there were to be no pedestrian crossings, underpasses and footbridges providing the necessary connections. The houses and flats are also set in green parkland, with roads, driveways and car parks relegated to secondary importance. Unfortunately, the underpasses have, often undeservingly, gained bad reputations, the footbridges are often of little use to the elderly, infirm and those with young children, no matter how gently the ramps slope, and the poor access to the properties by car has also generated problems.

The A8011 passing under the town centre building

In the centre of town, the vast concrete jungle of the town centre building was designed to include all of the shops, civic facilities, offices and associated functions literally under one roof. This includes several covered bridge spans across the main dual carriageway spine road through the town. Unfortunately, poor planning and the apparent lack of foresight for adding space and connecting new buildings has created a maze of corridors and steps which can be disorientating in a way which open air town streets seldom are. A modern extension has been built partly in place of one of the older sections of the development, but it is still poorly connected. This centre building is now flanked by large Tesco and Asda stores.

The classified road network around the town is perhaps not as dense as might be expected. The M80 separates the original new town zone from the more recent suburbs to the north west, and the parallel A8011 runs through the town centre as noted above. This road turns at either end to meet the motorway, and is almost all garde-separated. The only at-grade junctions are the new roundabout proividing access to the car parks for Tesco and Asda! Towards the south of the town, and passing under the A8011 without a junction, is the A73 which terminates on the motorway after a long journey north from the borders. The south of the town is then served by two B roads, the B8039 and B8054, which have a number of, mostly unfinished, GSJs along their length, not least where the two cross.

The newer zone to the north is less well served with classified roads. The B8048 connects the ends of the A8011 and A73 and then runs west to Kirkintilloch. The B802 also crosses from south to north, little bothered by the developments as it mostly maintains its original route through Condorrat and Croy. The suburbs themselves are then served by unclassified distributor roads.

Before the town was built, the B802 and B8048, ran along similar routes to their current ones. The M80 was the A80, and the only other classified road at that time was the A73. This last took a very different route through the town, with the southern end now being the B8039, and the northern end the A8011. In between, almost all of the route has been lost to development.

Routes

Route	To	Notes
M80	Perth, Stirling
M80	Glasgow (M8), Carlisle (M73)
M876	Kincardine Bridge, Falkirk, Grangemouth	via M80
A73	Airdrie
A8011	(M80)	Signed both ways out of the Town Centre
B802	Kilsyth, Croy, Craigmarloch, Balloch
B802	Condorrant, Westfield
B816	Bonnybridge, Castlecary, Wardpark, Airport
B8039	Airdrie (A73), Blairlynn, Lenziemill, S Carbrain
B8048	Kirkintilloch, Blackwood, Smithstone
B8054	Seafair, Kildrum, N. Carbrain
A80	Stirling (M80), Kincardine Bridge (M876)	upgraded online to M80 in 2011
A80	Glasgow (M80, M8), Carlisle (M73)	upgraded online to M80 in 2011

Links

• Undiscovered Scotland