IN Brief:
- £2.8m will support construction of three major active-travel routes beginning between November 2026 and February 2027.
- A further £920,000 will progress design work on the next group of Glasgow projects.
- £5.4m of Tier 1 funding covers crossings, pavements, public realm and other accessibility improvements.
Glasgow City Council has secured more than £9.3m for the next phase of walking, wheeling and cycling infrastructure across the city, combining construction funding for three major routes with design work, public-realm improvements and smaller accessibility measures. The latest allocation moves several projects towards site delivery, with construction starts planned between November 2026 and February 2027.
The package includes a £3.7m award from Transport Scotland’s Active Travel Infrastructure Fund Tier 2 programme. Of that amount, £2.8m is allocated to construction of Connecting Battlefield phase two, Connecting Yorkhill and Kelvingrove phases two and three, and East City Way phase five.
Work is expected to begin on a project-by-project basis rather than through a single city-wide mobilisation. That allows procurement, detailed design and traffic-management arrangements to progress independently across the three corridors while still placing each scheme within the same funded delivery programme.
The remaining £920,000 of Tier 2 funding will support design work for future projects including Anderston Plaza, Connecting Glasgow Inner North and Inner South, Connecting Greater Govan phase one, and Connecting Yorkhill and Kelvingrove phase four. Those allocations keep schemes moving through design while the current construction packages enter delivery.
A further £5.4m of Tier 1 funding will support smaller public-realm and accessibility interventions. Planned work includes pedestrian improvements around Thornwood Roundabout on Dumbarton Road, design development for phase two of the Merchant City People First Zone, safer crossings, wider pavements and school cycle shelters.
Tier 1 funding will also progress design on future sections of East City Way, Connecting Greater Govan and Flourishing Molendinar. Together, the construction and design allocations give the council a rolling programme rather than concentrating the funding on schemes already sufficiently advanced to start on site.
Just over £225,000 of Local Authority Direct Award funding completes the package. This will support road-safety education in schools, walking and cycling route mapping, winter gritting of cycle routes, the council’s staff travel plan and projects delivered with community organisations and major employers.
The most immediate construction workload sits within the £2.8m allocated to the three named routes. Connecting Battlefield phase two will extend an existing corridor, Yorkhill and Kelvingrove phases two and three will develop the west-end network, and East City Way phase five will advance another section of the city’s eastern route.
Urban active-travel schemes carry more construction complexity than the lane markings associated with older cycling programmes. Protected routes have to integrate with junctions, crossings, bus stops, loading arrangements, drainage, utilities and existing kerb lines, while public-realm work can add paving, landscaping and accessibility requirements to the same street section.
Construction also has to take place within live roads and commercial areas. Temporary traffic management, pedestrian routes, access to properties and coordination with other utility or highway works can influence the programme as strongly as the physical installation of segregation, crossings and surfacing.
The funding split reflects another feature of long-term infrastructure programmes: a city needs new projects moving through design while current projects are being built. Without that overlap, contractors can face periods in which one phase ends before the next has completed consultation, approvals and procurement.
Glasgow’s latest allocation therefore provides immediate work while keeping subsequent corridors sufficiently advanced to compete for future capital. The £920,000 design programme does not guarantee construction funding for every project, but it reduces the amount of development work still required if later allocations become available.
The council’s City Administration Committee considered the Active Travel Infrastructure Funding package on 17 September. With the Tier 2 allocation approved, the construction programme now moves towards mobilisation, beginning with the first of the three funded corridors in November.
The sequence runs into February 2027, meaning Glasgow will be delivering new infrastructure while design teams develop the next phases behind it. The £9.3m package is consequently spread across construction, design and smaller network improvements rather than attached to a single headline project, maintaining a pipeline of work at several different stages of delivery.
