How much of what's happened throughout this debate could have been anticipated & avoided?
The thing is, I don't think the SNP majority was really about independence at all. I know that this was pushed fairly quickly afterwards by WM - the 'put up or shut up' stance to force SNP's hand, and I think it's true that even then SNP didn't really think they'd get close to a yes so were keen for the devo max option. I hindsight, I'd say that this wasn't just the failsafe option for SNP, but the failsafe option for the union. Now we all know SNP want independence, yet they got a majority when the opinion polls suggested there wasn't an appetite for independence (certainly not anywhere near what the polls suggest now). The SNP majority was IMO about the discontent with what is happening in politics - it's the same reason UKIP has a higher profile now too. The writing has been on the wall for years, with expenses, austerity, welfare cuts, tuition fees, cutting the 50p tax rate, ATOS, bedroom tax, workfare, flipping homes, making fortunes from tax payer funded homes bought to house MPs & their families. You could list numerous issues that have come up over the years where the perception is that politicians believe they are a 'special case' when compared to the many ordinary people whose votes they depend on.
There has been a huge gamble on both sides - SNP gambling the financial future of iScotland when so much is uncertain & WM gambling the stability of the whole of the UK & the union, by not actually engaging in any kind of debate or discussion over what the concerns of the Scottish electorate are. The thing is, both are likely to lose so much irrespective of the outcome.
We have very different issues in Scotland compared to a massively over populated SE where the concentration of money & talent & expensive property skews the outlook in comparison to the rest of the UK. How can monetary policies really address both sides of that divide fairly or reasonably? HS2 is a prime example - that's designed to help manage the overspill from the saturation point that commutable areas from London cut off from the rest of the UK & barely touches the overall imbalance with how the country (inc Scotland) as a whole should benefit from the redistribution of business to address the unemployment & poverty traps in areas that haven't recovered from the loss of big industries. Even long after thatcher has gone from frontline politics, it's no exaggeration to say her legacy still lingers on many parts of the UK. 20/30 years after she was in power & I still see areas close to me that have remained decimated, with high unemployment, low paid insecure employment. That's a failure of every government since thatcher - the disillusionment with WM is a real & tangible feeling out with the SE (and within it too as posted by quite a few on these threads). The fact is, WM/BT have gambled in ignoring this in the hope that Scotland would 'pipe down' eventually & the momentum would fizzle out, but without doing anything about the many concerns that are bubbling away all over the UK.
Much of the uncertainty has been engineered through the stubborn stances on both sides - WM refusal to address the issues before a referendum & SNP for hammering on despite the lack of detail or certainty because WM refuse to engage in a meaningful debate/discussion. The whole thing could & should have been better managed. Discussions about those issues should have happened between SG & WM, between all Scottish parties & all of the UK parties before the referendum parameters were set & the date confirmed. The failure to do that has left us all staring over a cliff, for both sides because IMO the concerns of everyone involved are valid as far as I'm concerned.