The Herald

On the top floor of Skypark, a glass box of an office building in Glasgow, Paul Stallan is surveying the future of the city. Hundreds of feet below, cars flash by silently on the M8, heading in and out of the city centre, while nearby the River Clyde continues its remorseless journey to the sea. In times past, the Clyde was the key to Glasgow's prosperity. Now, as he gazes down on the river and its surroundings – the SECC on the north bank and the Science Centre and Braehead retail park on the south – Stallan, design director of the architectural giants RMJM, suggests that it might be so again. As he speaks, he points out new developments along the river: Pacific Quay, where the BBC Scotland and rival broadcasters Scottish TV will eventually decamp to; the site of the Riverside Museum, where work is scheduled to begin in 2007; and Glasgow Harbour, a 130-acre brownfield site that will one day house 6,000 people. It's as if, Stallan says, the city is on the march down the river. "I think the edges of Glasgow are now blurred."