Transport museum offers interactive lessons… in parking

Glasgow's Riverside Museum has been open only since last Tuesday and council chiefs have been repeatedly warning motorists to park elsewhere in the city and use public transport.

An estimated 10,000 visitors on Saturday and 15,000 in just six hours on Sunday - double the number for the opening day - turned up at the Zaha Hadid-designed museum of transport and travel.

The 74 million building at Pointhouse Quay has 300 parking spaces - 100 more than at its previous location opposite the Kelvingrove Museum & Art Gallery in the West End - but this was certainly not enough.

The car park of the neighbouring Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre (SECC) was opened at a cost of a 1 to relieve some of the pressure.

A passenger ferry also carried museum visitors across the River Clyde at Govan, and a bus service brought others from the city centre.

Staff at Glasgow Life, which runs the city's museums, said they always expected the Riverside to be a major draw, especially in its first weekend.

A spokesman said: "The Riverside Museum has been increasingly popular throughout the week. Detailed information about alternative methods of transport and overflow parking has been carried in newspapers and websites in recent weeks, and radio stations have been updating listeners about alternative parking as well.

"Signs on the roads to the museum have also been informing motorists when the car park is full. In the coming weeks, parking at the museum is likely to be busy at peak times and alternative car parks at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum and the Kelvin Hall will continue to be used as overflow parking for visitors to the Riverside Museum."

The former Transport Museum had almost half-a-million visitors each year before it closed last year to allow exhibits to be moved to the new location.

Riverside Museum is only ten minutes' walk from Partick train, subway and bus hub in the city's West End.

But Neil Greig, director of policy and research at the Institute of Advance Motorists, said alternative car parking will need to remain until public transport links improve.

He added: "Most people coming to this location are going to be tourists or with families and are going to want to come by car. They either need to make it much easier to get from the station to the museum or keep the extra car parking open in the meantime."