Glasgow’s fruit and vegetable wholesale market is to get a £5 million facelift, after the city’s council finally committed to a new management structure this week.
As of June 7, management of the Blochairn Fruit Market complex has been transferred to City Markets (Glasgow) LLP, which is fully owned by the council, and set up to manage market operations in Scotland’s second city.
The limited liability partnership will operate from the same office within the market, as previously, and all staff have been transferred across to the new structure. Graham Wallace, who was group manager of Glasgow markets, now becomes managing director of the new operation. He is joined on the board by chairman Ruth Simpson, an executive member for land and environmental services, as well as councillors Paul Carey, Frank Docherty, Steve Inch, the executive director of development and regeneration, and Jennifer Dunn.
Wallace told FPJ: “The council has leased the Blochairn market site with its fish, fruit and vegetables, and flower elements to the LLP, which will have control of management of the wholesale, retail, farmers’ and craft markets operating in Glasgow.
“The £5m investment in modernising the fruit market is a clear signal of the commitment of the council to the long-term future of the site. Plans are currently being drawn up, but the initial work will be underway by the end of this year, and will first address basic fabric repairs, to cladding, roofing, roadways and electrical installations.
“There has inevitably been conjecture about the future of the market in recent times, as people have waited for this type of decision to be reached,” added Wallace. “But tenants have responded very positively to the news, and we all now have the opportunity to invest and make the occupational aspects of the market more secure.
“We are going to be here for a few years to come, and the message that the site does have a future will also make it easier to attract new tenants into the market,” he said.
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