Evaluation of the Sighthill Bridge
Active Travel and transport, Communities, Other
Feb 2024 - Ongoing
The Glasgow Centre for Population Health has been commissioned by the Glasgow City Region Programme Management Office (GCR PMO) to undertake an impact evaluation of the Sighthill Bridge development in North Glasgow. The evaluation includes a contextual analysis of the area and recent regeneration activity, feedback from users (including pedestrians, cyclists and wheelchair users) and local residents on the utility and transformative impact of the new bridge and wider area regeneration, and an assessment of transferable learning to support future regeneration across Glasgow.
Context to the project
The redevelopment of the Sighthill Bridge has been undertaken as part of Glasgow City’s Canal and North Gateway project which is supporting regeneration activity across four sites: Sighthill; Speirs Wharf; Port Dundas; and Cowlairs. The opening of the new bridge in March 2023 represented an important milestone in the delivery of the Sighthill Regeneration Project as part of the UK and Scottish Government-funded Glasgow City Region City Deal.The Bridge has been upgraded to provide a safe and accessible walking, wheeling, and cycling link across the M8 corridor, connecting Sighthill residents with the amenities and wider travel links to the nearby city centre and neighbouring communities.
To support the evaluation, GCPH has appointed Axiom Research and Consultancy to undertake a survey of bridge users and to undertake focus groups with diverse populations to explore the issues, challenges and impacts of the new infrastructure and regeneration across the area.
Overview of page
Project objectives
The overall aim of this research is to evaluate the impact of the Sighthill Bridge and the wider regeneration of the Canal and North Gateway Project area, and to understand the distributional impacts of the regeneration on different population groups.
Five research questions have been identified to guide the evaluation:
- How has regeneration activity in the Canal and North Gateway Project area shaped opportunities and outcomes for the local population?
- Who uses the Sighthill Bridge, what types of journeys are being undertaken when using it, and for what purposes?
- Has the redevelopment of the Bridge resulted in changes to people’s travel habits (i.e. mode of transport, route taken, regularity of travel)?
- How do pedestrians, cyclists and wheelchair users using the Bridge feel about its design, quality, accessibility and safety?
- Do bridge users and residents have views on the wider regeneration of the Canal and North Gateway Project area in terms of access and perceptions of the local environment?
- What transferrable learning can be drawn from the Sighthill Bridge evaluation that can be applied to evaluations of other area regeneration projects?
What is involved
The evaluation includes four main research components, as follows:
- Contextual analysis of the Canal and North Gateway Project regeneration
- Survey of bridge users
- Focus groups with Sighthill residents
- Summary of transferable learning
Components two and three have been commissioned by the GCPH to Axiom Research and Consultancy. The remaining two will be completed by GCPH, and a final report bringing together learning from the components will be shared with the Glasgow City Region Programme Management Office in August 2024.
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