A GREENSPACE and food growing project at the SWG3 venue in Yorkhill is receiving a £200,000 boost as part of Glasgow City Council’s plan for tackling derelict land this year.

The initiative, involving land between railway lines, beside SWG, is among a number of schemes attracting a total of £2.3million under a programme aimed bring vacant space into productive use.

Fifty-one hectares of vacant and derelict land was returned to productive use in Glasgow in 2019 — the equivalent of 71 full-sized football pitches — a 5.1 per cent reduction, from 1,005 to 954 hectares, marking a decade of progress.

The number of vacant and derelict sites fell from 721 to 688 (sites greater than 1,000 square metres are counted). Most of the city’s vacant and derelict land is in the north and east of the city.

Around two-thirds of the land brought back into use was developed for residential purposes, with the next largest uses being greenspace, recreation and leisure.

Glasgow City Council is getting £2.3million from the Scottish Government for potential treatment and/or investigation of about 61 hectares in this financial year.

Measures will include remediation and/or decontamination of former brownfield and industrial sites; new and enhanced greenspace to benefit communities in areas of multiple deprivation; investigating and developing sites for food growing; and continued investment in projects with Clyde Gateway and the Glasgow Canal Regeneration Partnership.

The proposed programme includes:

— Cowlairs — £175,000 for development of greenspace as part of a housing masterplan

— Firhill Island — £246,000 for quay walls, service and access improvements

— Dalmarnock — £500,000 for environmental improvements at the site of the former gasometer in Dunn Street

— Dalmarnock — £150,000 towards drainage at Dalmarnock Riverside housing-led development

— Govan/Shettleston — £600,000 for relocation of showpeople sites from Water Row, Govan

— Yorkhill — £200,000 for greenspace and food growing as part of SWG3 Vision 2020