Braidbar Records

Reference:GB 3143 10
Dates of Creation:1873 - 2010
Name of Creator:
Language of Material:English
Physical Description:

Scope and Content
The Braidbar records comprise files, loose records, bound material, electronic files on compact disk, microfiche aperture cards, maps, plans and publications relating to the ownership, physical state, surveying, building on, and proposed remediation of, the site of the old Braidbar Quarries at Giffnock.
The records date from between 1873 and 2010, although most are from between 1982 and 2007.
Administrative / Biographical History
These records were generated or collated by officers of Eastwood District Council, by the Director of Central Services of East Renfrewshire Council in the period up to 2008, and by the Principal Solicitor of East Renfrewshire Council between 2003 and 2010.
Arrangement
This is an artificially created archive in that it has been brought together to facilitate access, rather than having grown organically from it's creating organisation. The records had no internal arrangement, and have now been sorted and listed as described below.
The archive has been arranged into the following subject headings:
1 Minutes of Council and Committees
2 Title deeds, etc.
3 Counsels' opinions
4 Planning records
5 Geotech and mineral reports
6 Correspondence, notes and general files
7 Macdonald Estates remediation plan
8 Maps and plans
9 Background papers
Files listed under "Planning Records" (section 4) comprise RCC and EDC planning applications, building warrant files, planning appeal files, and also other planning material such as local plan review files, and more general correspondence files.
Several items, in particular the Principal Solicitor's Macdonald Estates files (section 7) and some of the Correspondence, etc., files (section 6) are somewhat disordered, but the original order has been preserved.
Note that section 8 "Maps and plans" comprises only maps and plans which were not more appropriately stored elsewhere - there are maps, plans and drawings in various other sections, in particular section 4 "Planning records"
"Background papers" (section 9) comprise material about matters not necessarily directly related to Braidbar, but which had nonetheless been stored with the accessioned records.
Within each section or series individual items have been listed in chronological order, with the exception of Section 6, where the Director's correspondence files have been numbered consecutively at the end of the section (6/28-30).
The previous reference to files has been noted on the database under "JH" (Director's files list) or "PMcI" (Principal Solicitor's records).
Access Information
All the records are available for inspection [saving those covered by the opinion of the Scottish Information Commissioner (decision ref. 168/2012) re. Counsel's Opinions, etc.]
Acquisition Information
The records were transferred from Legal Services to the Council Records Manager under accession 2012/02.
Initially, it was felt that a small number of key records were apparently not present in the collection, and these were sourced from elsewhere:
The 1990 Counsel's Opinion and Memorial thereto were acquired from Brodies Solicitors in Jan 2012;
Copies of some of the EDC minutes: these were acquired from ERC's Committee Services in Dec 2011.
A further deposit was made in Feb 2014 (Ac. No. 2014/01) on the location of file "L/78". This file, comprising top copies of the Opinions, etc., was listed at
Note
This description was based on the General International Standard for Archival Description and East Renfrewshire Council's Manual of Listing and Archival Description.
Other Finding Aids
This item level list is searchable on the archives database, and the entire archive has been digitised. A copy of the archive (less items containing material identified as falling within the scope of OSIC 168/2012 as noted above) is available on request.
Archivist's Note
Description prepared by Craig Geddes, Council Records Manager. 9/2/12 - 25/10/12
Conditions Governing Use
Contact Records Manager
Appraisal Information
With the exception of a number of duplicate documents, all the records received by the Records Manager have been retained. There remains, in fact, considerable duplication of individual documents throughout the archive. It was felt that where a document appeared in more than one place it ought to be retained in situ, to allow it to be viewed within the different contexts provided by the original order of the documents.
Some material arguably not worthy of archival preservation has nonetheless been retained only because it was included in the previous handlist of the Director's records. An exception to this general rule is file ref. JH 49 (relating to the acquisition of Eastwood Park) which seems only to have been included in that list by error. That file is now listed as part of fonds "E", the records of Eastwood District Council.
Custodial History
The Director of Central Services retired from the Council in 2008 and his papers on Braidbar transferred to the Solicitor to the Council and were stored in her office at Council Headquarters at Eastwood Park until she retired in 2010. Thereafter, the papers were transferred to storage at Eastwood.
The Principal Solicitor retired in 2009, and her files were boxed and stored thereafter in the main Legal Services office at Eastwood Park.
No proper archival catalogue of these records was drawn up prior to the present list, although the Secretary to the Solicitor to the Council complied a basic inventory of the Director's records in 2010, and the Council Records Manager carried out a basic sort and compiled a hand-list of the Principal Solicitor's records in Nov/Dec 2011.
Accruals
No further accruals are expected.
Related Material
The archive of Eastwood District Council is also held by ERC Archives and is listed under ref. "E".
The records of the First District of the County of Renfrew are unlisted (as at 2012) but are also held by ERC.
The records of the County of Renfrew are mostly held by Glasgow City Archives.
There are also occasional references to Braidbar in ERC archive's Macfarlane albums (ref. 09) & the Community Archives (ref. 08)