Industrial ground and restoration

A council Single Outcome Agreement case study describes Redlees at the north end of Blantyre adjacent to Blantyre Farm Road. It calls the 27-hectare area disused industrial land and lists previous uses as quarry, military base, fishing pond and commercial woodland. In a report covering the council’s environment objective, the park project received £300,000 from South Lanarkshire Council and the Scottish Government Vacant and Derelict Land Fund. The work funded paths, car parking, pedestrian access and improvements to the pond and trees, with a conservation and management plan. The report describes an additional Heritage Lottery Fund application to develop the old anti-aircraft battery as a feature; it does not establish that application’s success or the later interpretation facilities. Council case study (South Lanarkshire Council: Single Outcome Agreement, Redlees Urban Fringe Park)

NatureScot’s revised Glasgow and Clyde Valley landscape assessment includes Redlees among urban-fringe parks created by restoration of previous land uses and specifically describes it as formed from an old quarry in Blantyre. That regional framing places the park within a wider pattern of post-industrial reclamation and community greenspace across the conurbation. It is landscape synthesis rather than an archaeological account of individual quarry phases. NatureScot, Landscape Character Assessment (NatureScot: Glasgow and Clyde Valley Landscape Character Assessment)

A Helensburgh and West Dunbartonshire Ramblers outing in April 2023 walked a 10-kilometre circuit from the David Livingstone Centre along the Clyde Walkway and back through Redlees, passing the quarry pond and anti-aircraft battery. The group says the pond is on the site of a sandstone quarry and clay pit that closed in the 1980s and then flooded, and dates the council park development to 2010–12.

Anti-aircraft battery and quarry pond

The battery’s official record names include Blantyre Ferme, Blantyre and Uddingston; the later site name “The Whins” is not the name used in public records consulted by Secret Scotland. A 1941 RAF oblique photograph, cited by the Blantyre Project, reportedly shows four gun emplacements already built. Its account says the wider site later contained six, and records four 4.5-inch guns and a GL Mk II gun-laying radar in 1942–43, followed by four 3.7-inch guns by 1945. These details remain mediated because the cited service records and original aerial photograph have not been examined. Blantyre Project (Blantyre Project: WWII anti-aircraft battery) · Secret Scotland (Secret Scotland, Blantyreferme battery)

A GUARD Archaeology watching brief for South Lanarkshire Council ran from 26 March to 21 May 2012 during park works. The ADS catalogue abstract reports that clearing battery interiors exposed metal footings and gun fixtures. Later works monitored vegetation and earth-bank removal and regrading; structures and features were documented in plans, photographs and pro-forma records, and built remains encountered were left in situ. These are catalogue-abstract findings; the full report remains unread. ADS catalogue, Mooney and Bailie 2012 (GUARD Archaeology watching brief catalogue) The Council’s 2010–11 report described a Heritage Lottery Fund application for interpretation as pending. Secret Scotland later reports the park was extended in 2012 to include the remains, and the Woodland Trust says emplacements are partly being restored as a “living museum”. That wording describes interpretation/restoration, not reconstruction to wartime condition. Woodland Trust (Woodland Trust: Redlees Urban Park)

Access and ecological setting

The council reserve statement identifies Redlees as part of the Bothwell, Blantyre and Uddingston Local Nature Reserve and connects it to the Clyde-side path network. The Woodland Trust visitor entry calls it a “South Lanarkshire Council Wood”, gives grid reference NS68075980 and area 25.45 hectares (62.88 acres), and describes paths around the pond and emplacements. This is a visitor listing, not an ecological assessment. The Council park report gives 27 hectares; the difference may reflect measurement scope or rounding, which has not been established. The park offers paths and links towards Blantyre and Uddingston; the 2023 Ramblers circuit illustrates how visitors can combine it with the Clyde Walkway and David Livingstone Centre. Bothwell, Blantyre and Uddingston Local Nature Reserve David Livingstone and Blantyre

The broader reserve documentation describes Redlees and other parts of the Clyde corridor as a mix of wooded sites, old industrial ground and habitat connections. It records historic woodland and species surveys at the larger reserve level, but the Redlees pages examined here do not provide an up-to-date, park-specific biodiversity census. The park’s former uses and current ecological value should therefore be read together without assuming that restoration erased its industrial history. Cocksburn and Bellsfield community woodlands

  • naturescot landscape character assessment redlees
  • ramblers redlees park circuit 2023
  • slc single outcome agreement redlees
  • secret scotland blantyreferme battery
  • Woodland Trust: Redlees Urban Park
  • ADS catalogue: Redlees Quarry and Anti Aircraft Battery (GUARD Archaeology, 2012)
  • blantyre project ww2 blantyreferme aa battery