The Site
The site is outlined in red on the site plan below.
It is located within the village of New Stevenston, to the south of Clydesdale Street and west of Coronation Road East.
Bounded to the north by Clydesdale Street, with the Lanarkshire Muslim Centre beyond, to east lies Coronation Road East, with residential dwellings beyond. The site is bound to the west by a railway line, and to the south by Vallourec Tube Works.
Previously known as Clydesdale Iron and Steel Works, Stewart and Lloyd's Clydesdale Works was established in the late 19th-century, specialising in the manufacture of Siemens-Martin open-hearth steel. This was used in the production of steel plate for boilers, ships and bridges and for lap-weld iron and steel tubes for products including multi-tubular boilers, boring tubes and oil well casings. By 1945, specialism had occurred, and the works had four open-hearth 60 ton capacity furnaces supplying the plate rolling mills used to produce lap-weld tubing. Further specialisation occurred with the decision to build a seamless tube mill to satisfy the demand for higher quality tubes needed for a new generation of power stations.
The building of the first mill, known as No.1 Rotary Forge Mill, began in 1945 and was commissioned in April 1948. A second mill was established subsequently, and despite the later modernisation, the basic principle of generation remained unchanged. However, in 1975, the four open hearth furnaces were superseded by two 70 ton electric arc furnaces, each producing liquid steel for a continuous casting process from which the steel ingots used in the process are derived.
By the mid-1980s, Clydesdale Works had gone through phases of private and public ownership and emerged as one of a small group of Scottish works retained by the British Steel Corporation. The plant covered approximately 124 acres, employed 2, 500 people and produced seamless steel tubes ranging in diameter from 6 inches to 18 inches in diameter. The plant, which was the only producer of seamless tubes in the United Kingdom, operated in conjunction with Calder Works (closed 1986) in Coatbridge (which specialised in tube end joints and extruded plastic coatings) and the Imperial Works in Airdrie. Most output was destined for use in the oil industry.
At present the site has no particular use, is generally level and irregular in shape and once housed Clydesdale Works, which closed on 5th May 1991.
Within the Adopted North Lanarkshire Local Development Plan (July 2022), supports the development of this site for residential redevelopment.
An extract from the Adopted Local Plan is included below for reference purposes, as is an extract form the Modified North Lanarkshire Local Development Plan.
