Motorway Database
You are here: Home - Motorway Database - M74 and A74(M)
Main - Images - Timeline - Exit List
Two numbers, one road. The main road south from Glasgow, and indeed most of Scotland after it picks up the M73 and A702, is having something of an identity crisis.
In the 60s, most of the A74 from Gretna to Glasgow was upgraded to dual carriageway - as it passed through vast swathes of emptiness, slapping a second carriageway down wasn't a problem. Near the northern end the route begins to see some larger towns, and this part became the M74 to bypass all the built-up bits. By the early 1990s, the dual carriageway with all its nasty right turns, sharp corners and steep hills was getting overloaded. The Scottish Executive went ahead and spent a considerable amount of money on upgrading 60 miles of road to motorway, which was open by the early 1990s.
North of junction 13, this was built on a new alignment, and was called the M74. South of there, the road was mostly upgraded from the old dual carriageway, with a service road built alongside for non-motorway traffic, and was bizarrely called the A74(M). Giving an upgraded A-road a number like this is not unusual, but making a road arbitrarily change its number half way along certainly is.
The M74 is a very hot political potato right now. At its northern end, in Glasgow, politicians are still struggling with environmentalists, locals and each other to try and get the last few miles built so it will connect with the M8, despite this final section being an elevated one built through Glasgow suburbs. The construction work has been approved and there is now activity on site, but there are probably further protests to come.
At its southern end (or, strictly, the southern end of the A74(M)), the route is a continuous motorway right down to the M1 at Rugby, thanks to the M6. When the Scottish part of the motorway was built, the new signs were manufactured with "A74(M)" and "M74" on stuck-on plates, and it is known that if these were removed it would read "M6" underneath. The Scottish Executive is now being very sketchy over whether the numbering change will happen or not, even though the motorway became continuous with the M6 in 2008.
Aside from its current tricky situation, the M74 is one of Scotland's oldest and most interesting motorways. Its early, northern section, with two lanes each way, has some odd junctions, most notably the very pricey free-flow one at Motherwell - ironically one motorway junction that simply doesn't require free-flow sliproads.
Factfile
| Start | Glasgow (A74) |
| Finish | Gretna (M6) |
| Passes | East Kilbride |
| Length | 81 miles |
| Terminates | M73 |
| Spurs | None |
| Meets | None |
Main - Images - Timeline - Exit List
With thanks to Bob, Hugh Everett, Alistair Stewart, John Prentice, Stuart Clink and Bill Brown for information in this section.
