Inside the urban planning offices of Glasgow City Council since time immemorial, fluorescent lights buzz and flicker. It’s too hot in winter, too cold in summer. Keyboards clack, computers hum. And Rip it Up by Orange Juice pulses through a built-in loudspeaker on repeat. Rip it up and start again. Rip it up and start again. Rip it up and start again. Into eternity. I’ve never been inside the council’s planning offices but I’m confident this is what I would find inside. Regardless of the decade.

Scotland’s largest city has been on the receiving end of some seriously poor urban planning decisions. Including, notoriously, ploughing the M8 through its heart. I would argue it was the worst urban planning decision ever made. Communities across the city were ripped apart, people’s sense of place completely wiped out. In financial terms, it was one of the most expensive infrastructure projects in Scotland at the time. The cost to the city’s culture and cohesion was priceless.

But this is not the only time the city has been let down by its local authority. The Squinty Bridge cost £20.3 million and was open just shy of a year before a cable snapped and it was closed for six months. It wasn’t a silver bullet for the city’s congestion issues and there are concerns its low height (5.4m above the river) prevents the River Clyde from being a fully working river. But it looks nice on postcards and on the evening news.

Another let-down was the Glasgow Airport Rail Link. It cost £30 million in land, compensation and other costs before it was scrapped. Spending on infrastructure generates long-term income and makes economic sense. Dipping your toe in, wasting millions and then claiming you axed an infrastructure project for the good of the public purse is questionable at best.

When the council announced they wanted to rearrange the furniture in George Square for the umpteenth time I will admit I thought it a colossal waste of money. Here we go again, I thought. We’re set for another embarrassing repeat of 2013’s antics whereby the council spent around £90,000 on a George Square design contest involving architects from around the world, only to U-turn on the £15 million project at the eleventh hour. Stephen Miles, a council member of the Glasgow Institute of Architects at the time, called it a “shameful waste of time and money for the architectural profession”.

In the shadow of these urban planning missteps, I was sceptical when the diggers rolled into Sauchiehall Street and started chewing up the pavement. And they want to demolish Buchanan Galleries? It’s barely 25. And St Enoch Centre? A mere millennial! Those planners are really letting Edwyn Collins get inside their heads.

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And then something strange happened earlier this week. A timetable for the biggest transformation of Glasgow’s public realm in half a century was laid out in The Herald. I’ve followed the fractured progress of The Avenues project for years, but seeing the council’s ambitious streetscape plans laid out in full felt like a breath of fresh air. And reader, my shrivelled little Grinch heart grew three sizes that day.

Funded through the City Deal and various other Government streams, the programme involves transforming “the look and feel” of 21 areas with work on 11 “Avenues” starting early next year. The project is aimed at making the city pleasant for people rather than cars which in turn should boost economic activity. Streets will also be equipped with better drainage, lighting and lovely trees. We’re calling it the “most significant change” since the 1970s pedestrianisation of Buchanan Street. It mostly encompasses the city centre but extends to the East End, promising to better connect Duke Street to George Street. Works will be completed in phases and are expected to carry on through 2028. Some moan that years is too long to wait but I will remind you that Rome was not built in a day. Glasgow City Council must get better and communicating at explaining these types of projects.

The Herald revealed earlier this month that Buchanan Galleries owner Landsec had ditched its £800 million plans to tear down the shopping centre. Though I doubt that saving carbon emissions had much to do with it, it did show a little positive faith in the city centre’s retail activity. St Enoch Centre and Princes Square have had a string of welcomed businesses moving in. Things are looking up.

The city’s decline, its stagnation, its dereliction and decay have been dominating the news cycle for weeks. Months even. I’ve written about it myself. But for all the times I’ve muttered about Glasgow not being able to have nice things, a little part of me thinks that surely this fatalistic attitude is not painting the full picture. Would I still be here after a decade if this city had no redeeming qualities?

The Avenues project is not the most ambitious, but it is good enough. And that’s okay. Because at least it’s progress. For the first time in months, I think this is something we can be optimistic about. It won’t be perfect but at least this is something positive.

There is something to be said for a city that constantly tries to reinvent itself, even if it fails. Especially amid the ever-present backdrop of multiple deprivation and crisis upon crisis: housing, cost of living, drugs, homelessness, energy. It’s still the funniest city in the world, in my books. Perhaps an enduring trauma response, but one that speaks to the stoic resolve of Glaswegians.

This is our city. It’s dark and dreary. It can, at times, look like someone let off a party popper full of cigarette butts and used gum on a Jackson Pollock of vomit. But it’s also resilient, witty and warm. It’s beautiful, challenging and it gets under your skin. I feel we are on the precipice of something good, so let’s just take the good when it comes. Let Glasgow Flourish, and all that.

Marissa MacWhirter is the editor of The Glasgow Wrap. Each morning, Marissa curates the top local news stories from around the city, delivering them to your inbox at 7am daily so you can stay up to date on the best reporting without ads, clickbait or annoying digital clutter. Oh, and it’s free. She can be found on X @marissaamayy1