It was the terminus for Glasgow’s 44-year-old Underground trains, as the last old-fashioned trains made their last run through the underground loop.
The city’s metro has been gradually phasing out the old trains since December and replacing them with new wheelchair-accessible modern cars.
A total of 17 trains will gradually be put into use in the period up to and including 2024.
The new rolling stock is just part of a £288 million upgrade program for the metro system, which will include platform doors and driverless trains in the future.
- Author, Jamie Russel
- Role, BBC Scotland News
Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT), which operates the metro, reported that the last two trains each covered an estimated 4.2 million kilometers of passenger traffic – 400,600 loops of the system.
Driver Julie Baker, who took one of the trains for its final run, said she was trying not to cry as she had been driving it for 35 years – almost as long as its lifespan.
“I’m actually emotional, but it’s time to change,” she said.
Julie has worked at SPT since she was sixteen and passed her driver’s test in her early twenties.
“There were quite a few girls riding at the time, but it seems more men are doing it now – the services are not always family friendly,” she said.
“But that’s all I’ve ever known.
“I expect a large pension and good old-age provision in the coming years when the trains no longer have drivers,” she said.
The old trains entered service on April 16, 1980 as part of the system’s second modernization project, which started in May 1977.
This project closed the metro for three years.
It introduced 33 Metro-Cammell trains to the system, with eight additional carriages built in 1992 to make all trains three carriages long.
One of the old carriages has been moved to the Riverside Museum in Glasgow as part of the transport exhibitions.
The new third-generation trains are the same length as the older carriages, but have a “walk-through” design and are air-conditioned.
According to SPT, the trains should be more comfortable and quieter.
The new trains are also the first to be wheelchair accessible, with a dedicated wheelchair space. However, only two of the metro’s fifteen stations have a lift to help people with mobility issues.
The Glasgow Underground, often referred to as the ‘Clockwork Orange’ due to its striking orange colour and single-loop design, has undergone its third modernisation since 2012.
This included a renovation of all 15 stations, a new smart ticketing system, new rolling stock (trains) and the introduction of a new signaling, communications and control room system.
The third generation of trains can also run without a driver. The operator wants to make this possible in the future.
SPT will also install platform screen doors on station platforms as part of the £288 million renovations.
Interior designer Anna Campbell Jones, who is also a jury member of ‘Scotland’s Home of the Year’, designed the seating pattern (moquette) on the older trains.
Campbell-Jones, from Glasgow, told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland program that it was her first design job after graduating from Glasgow School of Art.
The old chairs were covered with 100% mohair and Scottish leather.
“It was in the early 1990s when the old carriages were converted,” she said.
“It’s incredible how long they’ve lasted and I feel incredibly old that something I designed will now be in a museum.”
SPT Chairman Councillor Stephen Dornan said it was a sad day to say goodbye to the beloved fleet.
“I know many of the staff, current and retired, and many passengers have been keen to come along for a final spin through the system in recent weeks,” he said.
Richard Robinson, SPT’s director of transport operations, told Good Morning Scotland that the new designs make the metro fit for the 21st century.