Greater Glasgow

Greater Glasgow is an urban settlement in Scotland consisting of all localities which are physically attached to the city of Glasgow, forming with it a single contiguous urban area (or conurbation). It does not relate to municipal government boundaries and its territorial extent is defined by the General Register Office for Scotland, which determines settlements in Scotland for census and statistical purposes. Greater Glasgow had a population of 1,199,629 at the 2001 census making it the largest urban area in Scotland and the fifth largest in the United Kingdom.

A more extensive Greater Glasgow concept covers a much larger area, and may include Ayrshire down to Ayr as well as the whole of Lanarkshire down to Lanark, Dunbartonshire, Renfrewshire and Inverclyde, with a population of over 2 million: Stirlingshire might also be included as it was a part of The Strathclyde Regional Council Area centred on Glasgow and with a population of 2.5 million. At present the Glasgow and Clyde City Region consists of the Glasgow City Council Local Authority, Lanarkshire, Dumbartonshire, Renfrew and Inverclyde, with a combined population of over 1.7 million. This city-region is described as a metropolitan area by its own strategic planning authority, and is similar to the Glasgow metropolitan area identified by the European Union.

Arriva Scotland West

Arriva Scotland West was a bus company based in Inchinnan, near Paisley, Scotland. It was formed in 1997 as a rebranding of the former Clydeside 2000 company when purchased by Arriva. On 26 March 2012, the business was sold to McGill's Bus Services.

History

Clydeside was formed as Clydeside Scottish in June 1985 from the northern operations of Western SMT to prepare the state-owned parent company, the Scottish Bus Group, for deregulation.

At the time, Clydeside's operating area was much larger, covering Inverclyde (including the towns of Gourock and Greenock), the Isle of Bute and much of the south side of Glasgow. Clydeside was re-merged with Western Scottish (Western SMT's successor company) in 1989 in an attempt to make it more financially viable. However, on the privatisation of Western Scottish the Clydeside operations were sold in a management buyout as Clydeside 2000 plc with Luton & District taking a 23% stake. Clydeside began rationalising some of its operations, and depots at Largs, Paisley and Thornliebank were closed, the latter as a result of a reduction in operations within Glasgow.