In the spring of 2020 an invisible, semipermeable dome came crashing down over Glasgow city centre. People are now repelled from crossing the invisible threshold, but four years later I’m still living underneath it. It’s lasted a lot longer than Stephen King’s (eight days). And yes, some people still actually live in the city centre.

This bell jar over the city is not alien in origin. The barrier is made of the cost-of-living crisis, overpriced parking, the LEZ, burned out buildings, poor cleansing and the worst culprit of all: an absolute joke of a “public” transport system.

A report from the Chamber of Commerce released this week found city centre sales were down £60 million in April. Compared to last May, 410,000 fewer visitors dared enter the dome and GDP has fallen by 15.1% since 2014. One of the report’s recommendations to stop the region from haemorrhaging anymore capital is to either discount or eliminate public transport and parking charges on certain occasions.

The report was conveniently released a week after SPT’s extortionate new ZoneCard hit the shelves. The new travel card made our confused mess of a public transport system even more undesirable with cosmic price increases and a remix of travel zones. People don’t want to come to the city centre. Even if they did, it’s not so easy.

The new Glasgow Subway (Image: free)

For the uninitiated, the ZoneCard is a multi-modal, multi-operator commercial ticket arrangement that allows commuters to traverse our hodgepodge of bus operators, the Subway, ScotRail trains and two ferries. It’s similar to the Oyster Card in London........

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