I wish I could have been there. I wish I could have pushed my way into the crowd. I wish I could have seen the people dancing and cheering, and the children climbing on the statues, and the fireworks. I wish I could have done my bit to drink the pubs dry and when they turned the lights out I would have walked home with the rest of them, tired but happy.

The Glasgow Herald described that night in George Square on May 8, 1945 as “fine, robust and joyful” and of course it was: at a minute past midnight, the war in Europe was officially over and it seemed natural that everyone should crowd along Glasgow’s arteries to its heart. George Square is the city’s place of celebration, and conflict, and occasionally chaos. And it is (or at least it was) a jolly nice place to have a sandwich.

But let’s reverse the time travel: what if, instead of me going back to the ‘40s, the people who were there on VE Day could travel forward and see George Square, and the city, in 2022 – what would they make of it? They’d probably gawp at the gash through the city that’s called the M8. They’d probably sigh at the state of Sauchiehall Street. And as they wandered round George Square, they might very well ask: where have all the trees gone?

The answer is the council cut them down in the late 1990s. They also reduced the size of the lawns and covered the whole thing over with red tarmac whose tackiness made everyone wince and still does. The idea, you’ll recall, was to create more space for events. They called it commercialism. We called it vandalism.

Since then, successive councils have worried about how to fix the damage and plans have been suggested, then shot down. There was a plan in 2013 that would have got shot of the grass and many of the statues but such was the furore that the council backed off. Council leader Gordon Matheson admitted the people did not want a radical design of the square.

But now the council is back with another plan and, with considerable caution, I say that they seem to have learned their lesson. It’s the same architect as the 2013 plan – John McAslan – but he’s created a scheme that includes lots of greenery, grass and trees. Crucially, the statues will either be retained or relocated within the square.

Let’s deal with the statues first. There are some people who look at the men of stone and say ‘who are they?’ and fair enough many of them have been largely forgotten. But let me tell you who’s up on those plinths: a brilliant scientist, a great reformer, a passionate devolutionist and an inspirational inventor, among others. At least the statues are one way to remember them. They need to stay.

Retaining the statues, while also tweaking the design of the square, is also evidence that – maybe – the leaders of Glasgow have learned the lesson, which is that the best way forward is to retain and improve rather than rip it down (or cover it with red tarmac). The time-travellers from the 40s would be shocked by the M8 and rightly so: you do not improve a city by destroying its best bits.

Some people are still unconvinced by the plans for the square however. Some have summoned up memories of the trouble there when Rangers won the Champions League and have mocked the architect’s pictures of slim, sophisticated people reclining in the sun and that’s all fine to an extent: Glasgow is never going to be Paris or Milan. But we still deserve a beautiful space don’t we?

I also hope that this latest plan, the latest of many, will put things in their right place at last. The architects say they want to respect the square’s democratic and social history. Good. Perhaps it will get better. Perhaps one day I will push my way into a crowd. Perhaps I’ll see people dancing and cheering, and children climbing on the statues, and fireworks. And perhaps I’ll do my bit to drink the pubs dry and when they turn the lights out I’ll walk home with the rest of them, tired but happy.

Our columns are a platform for writers to express their opinions. They do not necessarily represent the views of The Herald.