It was recently announced that the site chosen for the replacement Monklands Hospital site was to be at Wester Moffat (or more precisely the land where Wester Moffat Farm once was.
In December 2019 I made a submission to the selection process which was then taking place, where I suggested land to the north of the A89 between Plains and Clarkston as a potential site. My submission was made precisely because I wanted to protect the greenbelt land to the south of the A89 – the land which has been chosen as the site of the new hospital.
When the shortlist was made available showing the final three potential sites, Gartcosh, Glenmavis and Wester Moffat, I was shown the “Assessment of Nominated Sites against Agreed Criteria” table which laid out the sites suggested and whether or not they were suitable. Mine was detailed at No46.
In this table it notes in Column 5 that the acres is “40+” with an asterisk which referred to the following note: ownership of this site is complex (11 landowners) – no individual site will exceed 40 acres after completion of EALR. Largest available site will be circa 30 acres.
As such column 8 stated that the proposal was of insufficient size. Too many land owners and apparently after the East Airdrie Link Road (EALR) is built, not enough space. It also noted in Column 12 that there was “Significant challenges providing second point of access”, which is frankly ludicrous as it was sited on the current A89 main road and would be immediately adjacent to the new EALR. Column 11 also noted that this land, like Wester Moffat, was green belt land, but had “limited potential for development” while the farmland at Wester Moffat had “potential for development”.
I accepted the above with a modicum of suspicion, as their reasons for removing the Plains/Clarkston proposal really didn’t stand up as far as I was concerned. Having now seen the results of the selection process and the map which accompanied it I am even more certain that something just wasn’t right.
The picture above is the one which is currently being used to illustrate the now chosen site (the red outline and hatching has been added by me). The arrows emanate from what presumably is the centre of the site, and the yellow dotted line is the line of the EALR. The text “views out to golf course would suggest to me that the site will not take in the land currently occupied by the golf course, and neither will it go further north than the North Calder Water. Clearly it will be constricted by the EALR and by Stepends Road to the south. So a reasonable estimate of the maximum footprint which could be occupied by the hospital is outlined in red.
Compare this with the map above. In blue is my original submission to the selection process. The red line is an approximation of the line of the EALR. In yellow is the maximum footprint we know is available for the Wester Moffat site.
The land at Plains to the east of the EALR exceeds the maximum footprint available to the chosen site. It has direct access to the A89, could have direct access to the EALR, close access to the A73 and would be within walking distance of Drumgelloch Station (and would create a good case for a new Plains Station). The proposed site does not have any main road in the vicinity and it will be interesting to see how much additional infrastructure this will require.
The EALR was going to have a detrimental affect on Clarkston Glen, the extent of which is not known. What is known is that the new hospital site will certainly increase that effect on a small area of green belt which deserved better protection, and will instead now be eradicated.
An Independent Scotsman 