The Spiral Hill Flagpole.
Or the “Plean Street Pyramid”,
or “Blawarthill Ziggurat”.
Ordnance Survey maps show it as an 18 metre hill, Apple Maps use the archaic Blawarthill and Bing maps ignores the space as empty! But we visited and it’s a spiral hill flagpole, just like Google Maps calls it, OpenStreetMap gives more hints to it’s history with the label “ziggurat on site of former Plean Street flats”. Whatever you decide to call it yourself it’s a wonderfully unusual urban curiosity to visit if you’re passing by.
A short walk along the streets south of Garscadden station is Plean Street. In the late 1800s Blawarthill Farm sat here as part of the larger Scotstoun Estate – “blawart” being an old Scots word for several small blue flower species such as bluebells. As Glasgow expanded west along the Clyde the Lanarkshire and Dumbartonshire Railway arrived and the estate was sold off piece by piece for housing.
By the 1960s Glasgow’s population was still growing and the homes built quickly to accommodate workers were falling far short of suitable for the late 20th Century. The 1960s brought huge plans for change to the city and in 1964 the council approved the building of two 20 storey tower blocks on the hill with flats for 114 families each. At first they were seen as the best of modern city living but they didn’t last long and within two decades had gained a bad reputation – in 2010 they were demolished.
Disappearing Glasgow documented the end of the tower blocks life with photos and a short video which you can view at www.disappearing-glasgow.com/portfolio/pleanst/
Today it’s an urban green space. We guess it’s some of the rubble from the flats that has been landscaped into a small hill. There’s a gently sloping spiral path taking you to the top marked by a flagpole with a metal pennant flag. There may once have been a plaque but we found nothing during our visit except for expansive views across the west of Glasgow. I may have given Rudy bigger expectations than the hill really is but he made up for it by running straight up & down several times while I took the spiral!
The old Lanarkshire and Dumbartonshire Railway route runs right past here – it’s now a foot & cycle path all the way from Partick to Yoker so the hill can be visited as part of a longer walk. We’ll definitely be exploring the rest of it!
Google Map location of the Spiral Hill Flagpole:
Photo Gallery:
Rudy waits at Hyndland to start today’s adventure! The view up Plean Street The Spiral Hill! The flagpole! The train home.
Philippa Wright 31 Jan 2023
I was there yesterday and have just looked it up to find your interesting article on the area. Thank you, I’ve shared it with my fellow walkers. Like you we walked up to the top via the spiral, sadly we didn’t have a Rudy with us to take the quick route.
Ian S. 7 Jun 2023
I grew up in the Plean Street flats on the 8th floor (number 83) we lived there from about 1965 till 1972. This was before the sad decline if these flats and have very fond memories of our time there, all the neighbors on our flour were friendly despite the different range in ages young families to pensioners and all were welcome in each others flats. Was a little sad to see all that remains is a flag pole.