Guide will help you put your best foot forward

A new walking guide to Bishopton’s Dargavel Village is encouraging people to get out and about.

Published by BAE Systems, which is developing the area at the former Royal Ordnance Factory, the guide highlights a number of routes around the village, plus connecting pathways to the surrounding area.

BAE Systems said:“It’s proven that good quality natural landscape in urban areas can help reduce stress and make us feel happier but, more importantly, it gives people the opportunity to exercise and to interact near to the places where they live.

“We have delivered open spaces as an integral part of the Dargavel Village development.

“A network of landscaped areas, including open water, is all linked by footpath and cycle routes.”

The first phase of the community parkland to the north of the village, which can be accessed from Slateford Road, leads to open countryside as far as Houston Road.

“This amenity will be rolled out in stages to give increasingly better access to woodland and country areas near the village,”BAE Systems said.

“We plan to build more open space and routes as phases of new development are brought forward.

“This includes Central Park – a large, multi-purpose recreation area at the very heart of Dargavel Village.”

Nature lovers will also be delighted to know that two pairs of barn owls have set up home in artificial nesting sites in the area, including a pair at a new barn owl tower in the north of the site near Formakin.

“As these birds are a protected species, we would ask that people keep their distance from the towers, as the birds are sensitive to disturbance,”BAE Systems said.

Other new additions site this year include the first breeding pair of kingfishers, a colony of sand martins and a green woodpecker.

BAE Systems says there is a chance of seeing the kingfishers around the Dargavel Ponds, where they often feed later in the summer and autumn.

This is also where resident mute swans reared five cygnets this year.

And colony of sand martins has taken up residence in the north.

They can regularly be seen flying over the sustainable urban drainage ponds by the new houses in the village.

Visit www.baesystems.com/bishopton for details