What suburb of Glasgow is good for families with young children?

[user1484749177]

Hello! This is my first post on mumsnet. I'm American with a Scottish husband and he may be accepting a job in Glasgow...we have family in Darvel, East Ayrshire and wondering if the mums here can direct me to good, affordable areas near there (within an hour) and Glasgow with good primary schools. I don't know too much at all. I'm completely overwhelmed looking at all the choices on righmove :)

We plan to have one car for family, and DH will take train into Glasgow so being near public transport would be a priority. Schools are my biggest concern...is there a site that shows ratings for primary schools. They are all under age 10. THANK YOU for your help!

I'm in East Dunbartonshire and the schools are fantastic here. There is a decent train connection to Glasgow (Milngavie, Bearsden then through the West End) and lots of young families.

If you come out to Bridge of Weir or Houston, in Renfrewshire, there are trains from Johnstone, and a bus service straight up the M8 to Buchanan Bus Station in central Glasgow.

The schools there are good, and you are within easy reach of the coast, the Muirshiel hills and Glasgow.

Thank you so much everyone. I'll be searching them all -- so many areas I had not even heard of. I appreciate it :)

We aren't very religious :) I think our plan is not to stay more than a few years so high schools are not really on my radar right now. (Never say never though of course!)

Neither east dunbartonshire nor renfrewshire are particularly handy for Darvel. You're looking at more than an hour to get there.

I have a colleague that commutes to glasgow from strathaven (pronounced stray-ven, don't ask) which is do-able by car but not train, and there are decent schools around there. lovely countryside too.

By train you could consider the kilmarnock area. Its about 40 minutes on train from there to glasgow. Surrounded by nice countryside but don't know anything about the schools.

Then there are all of the suburbs/towns just south of glasgow (east kilbridge, giffnock, newton mearns, eaglesham). Some are in Glasgow council district, some are East Renfrewshire council district. A lot of East Ren public schools have a good reputation but then house prices reflect that (especially areas like Giffnock, Newton Mearns).

I believe individual council districts publish stats about the public schools in their area. Assume you're not looking for private schools but think they're covered too.

Guess it depends on your definition of 'affordable'...

Giffnock/Newton Mearns/Newlands - lovely, great schools, expensive

Clarkson/Muirend - more affordable but still good

South Lanarkshire - Hamilton/Bothwell/Uddingston/Carluke/Lanark - affordable grows the further out you go, commute is 60mins max to Central Station, good schools, nice towns, good for bringing up family.

Ayr - again good commute to city centre, lots of nice areas, lots going on

Do you have a budget as that will make a big difference on where you can go.

An hours commute covers a huge area in central belt term as it would cover Edinburgh to Ayr and a lot more north/south of the city.

Also what will you be doing as you could end up quite isolated depending on where you go.

Thank you all so much. I suppose just peering through 3-Bedroom rentals, our budget would be trying to stay under £1000 a month, would be much nicer if lower, though (seeing some around £750). A big problem with our potential move is the salary is much lower in Scotland than the US one...so the lower we can get our rent, the better. I was hoping for within an hour to Darvel just for sake of visiting Grandparents. Somewhere close to a rail station even if the commute goes up to 45-60 minutes to City Center would be fine.

Kilmarnock would be ideal, but it's one of the few places my DH knows about and it's not entirely favorable. Does anyone know specifically about the schools and neighborhoods there? Some of his family grew up there in the housing scheme that I guess they made into a reality show (I think it was called "the Scheme" or something) about junkies so I'm sure it was totally unfair, but kind of hard to shake the image!

if I may add more questions...we are really struggling with the decision to come. Can you all estimate a typical grocery/utilities/mobile phone bill? I'm really worried it may not be feasible...such an exciting prospect I don't want to lose sight of reality.

Haha! The Scheme showed a great side of Kilmarnock, but there are nice bits too. Well, there must be I'm sure, I admit I don't know Kilmarnock.

We've recently returned to the UK and so adjusting to prices again. We're spending around £100-120 in the supermarket (mix of Aldi, Waitrose, Tesco etc which includes ready made pizzas, 'nice' stuff, wine etc) and we found good mobile contracts at £20/mth which included a heap of data.

Lol Scotinoz. I regret watching the YouTube videos! His grandparents / mom lived there for decades.

Thanks--sounds like your grocery shopping is like mine. I go to 3 stores here. Is that per week for you?

Again really appreciate the insights from everyone.

I would consider an hour to be a very long commute here - you can cross the county in an hour (I used to commute from south Glasgow to Edinburgh by train every morning in the time it took a friend of mine to travel between two zones in London).

There is a thread running in ABIU today about moving to Glasgow from London which might me helpful?
There is also a 'scotsnet' section of mumsnet which might connect you with Scottish people.

Personally I don't know Kilmarnock, that is through choice, I don't want to go there. I have met lovely people from there, but it's not a place to move continents for.

Estimting bills is tricky - You could buy a pay-and-go phone and top it up £10 a month and be happy. I pay £35 a month for an unlimited package on an iPhone (not the latest).
Utilities would include tv licence (£145 a year), council tax (varies depending on council but is linked to the value of the property), car tax and mot (varies depending on how environmentaly friendly your car is), contents insurance (your landlord will have buildings insurance so you will need contents), broadband (£20 pcm approx). Gas and electric will depend on the size of the property.

If you want more than freeview tv then basic packages start around the £45 mark I think. Choice is limited because the company who started cabling kinda ran out of steam when they got to Scotland. Some streets in some cities can get virgin media, some cannot. In some cases they cabled half the street, got bored, wondered off. Which leaves most people with either BT or Sky. Competition is not keeping prices down.

(Sweeping generalisation) schools are good here - but some are better than others. If you can find the thread about moving from London to Glasgow, it ran to 7 pages last time I looked and spoke about schools.

Thank you! I found that post. Sigh...we are still working out the pros and cons of this move and also on a pause while they do references. I'm not sleeping so great. Thanks so much to everyone--you gave me a lot of info to chew on :)