AS protesters gathered outside the City Chambers to condemn development plans in Glasgow’s West End, councillors met in a committee room upstairs to determine its fate.

Members of Glasgow City Council’s planning board granted an application from Queensberry Properties to widen the access road on Otago Lane by removing the two metre wide raised footway to create a shared surface for pedestrians and vehicles along the lane.

Councillor Tony Curtis believes this move will prevent vehicles from parking on the pavement along Otago Lane.

READ MORE: 'Most entertaining protest' as Otago Lane plan backed

He said: “You can see from the pictures that cars park on the walkway. I think that pedestrians could be safer if there is no pavement because cars won’t be able to park on it.”

A further application to develop four town houses and 45 flats is expected to be discussed by the planning board in the new year.

Councillor Curtis also raised some concern about the planning history of the site and that some members might not be fully aware of the tensions surrounding it.

He continued: “Previous applications regarding this site have been brought to committee but with different members on the board at that time. I don’t know if I have enough information to make an educated decision.”

Throughout the 20th century the site was developed on with most of the river bank occupied by a large single storey structure with an undercroft to the riverside.

Historic Ordinance Survey Maps show that a garage and adjacent bakery building extended back from Otago Street into the site until the 1980s.

The buildings fronting Otago Street were two and three storeys in height.

In 1988, planning permission was granted for erection of 89 flats with a four storey block fronting Otago Street, a six storey block fronting the River Kelvin and a four storey block facing Otago Lane.

A subsequent committee report states the site was cleared in 1989 and consolidation works carried out in relation to former mine workings.

Other than these operations no further works appear to have taken place relative to the 1988 permission.

In 1997, planning permission for the development of 48 flats, formation of associated vehicular parking and landscaping was granted subject to conditions by committee.

These are the brick faced flats, associated parking and landscaping which currently occupy 65 – 77 Otago Street.

READ MORE: Otago Lane: Plans revealed for flats in Glasgow's West End

In August 2009 local campaigners began their decade long battle against further development on the site.

Since then, ten subsequent planning applications for the site have been withdrawn.

The most recent application was submitted again in June to build four town houses and 45 adjoining flats with five different blocks between three and eight storeys high.

At yesterday’s planning application members were only presented with plans to widen the road at Otago Lane.

Councillor Robert Connelly said: “What we are looking at here is to change the design of the access road which was approved in previous versions of the planning application. There is no need to revisit it. I don’t see what choice we have but to approve it.”