After Kinning Park, Pollok was idyllic, bucolic even \u2013 green space and a house with three bedrooms and a bathroom. When my family moved there we were glad, having lived in a privately rented hovel for years, but for all its obvious advantages, Pollok felt remote, with little by the way of amenities. Like many uprooted families, we tended to stick to our old patch at weekends, returning to the bustling Paisley Road Toll, just as others would return to Victoria Road, Duke Street or Dumbarton Road, depending on which overspill outpost they were consigned to. Part of the motive for this mass exodus was the bars since none of the schemes had any licensed premises thanks to the city\u2019s policy on \u2018dry\u2019 wards. For instance, Castlemilk in the south-east with a population on a par with Perth, say, had no pub until the aptly-named Oasis opened in Dougrie Drive (in the early 80s, I think) provoking riots. I recall reading one newspaper report claiming that on its opening night, the Oasis was stripped of its furniture by marauding punters.<\/p>\n
In the space of a generation, Pollok went from barren backwater to Beirut. Having nothing better to do, youths formed gangs and staked out their territories \u2013 the Krew, the Bundy, the Car-D, the Pen \u2013 staging pitched battles and generally defiling the area. The housing stock, already jerry-built in the 50s, had deteriorated further. By the 70s, with a sharp rise in unemployment, Pollok, along with all the other schemes \u2013 Drumchapel, Easterhouse and Castlemilk \u2013 was past its sell-by.<\/p>\n
In truth, Pollok today is not as conspicuously derelict as it used to be. Parts of it are still grim though \u2013 the Brockburn Road \u2013 but with demolition of the worst parts, Thatcher\u2019s right-to-buy scheme, the selling-off of land and the arrival of private housing development, on the outside at least, most of the houses look sound and reasonably well-maintained.<\/p>\n
My first stop is 87A Linthaugh Road. I take a couple of shots and notice a young woman and a toddler emerging from what once was our family home. I\u2019m struck by how quiet the streets are. There are few cars, apart from the occasional family saloon doubling as a private taxi, seemingly a popular route to income in the absence of any real jobs, if you exclude those on offer at the recently opened Silverburn shopping centre, which in its past incarnation boasted the largest Tesco in Scotland, a distinction now belonging to its Port Glasgow store.<\/p>\n My purpose isn\u2019t about nostalgia though. On the Google Earth file I discover that one of Harry\u2019s alignments passes straight through number 87 which only reinforces my connection to the idea of lines, invisible tracks. That, and the disquieting feel of the place. Directly opposite our old house, the White Cart Water slips past lazily as ever, a reminder of how not once but twice I almost drowned in its brown murk. The river originates near Eaglesham, close to the De’il’s Plantin, forming another connection in my mind. Meanwhile in Lochar Park, three men open the back of a white transit and wheel out a mini quad bike to indulge their kids. The only other pedestrian is an elderly woman in full make-up, hunched over, lighting a cigarette. Traffic calming in the area means passing drivers can more easily rubberneck as I stand on the pavement with my camera.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.elementalfilms.eu\/devilsplantation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2007\/11\/87a_linthaugh_road.jpg\")
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