Sold down the River: Dumbarton Studios home of Scottish soap opera sold to developer

Disappointed members of the cast of TV soap opera River City.

by Lucy Ashton

End of the road for fictional Glasgow neighbourhood Shieldinch as the studio location for River City is sold to a developer following the cancellation of the BBC drama.

Dumbarton Studios has been home to Scottish productions including Still Game, Shetland and Two Doors Down.

BBC Scotland had a long-term lease for the 18,000 sq ft of studio space with backlot and build space that was the home for soap River City for the past two decades, providing a platform for emerging acting, writing and technical talent.

With River City set to broadcast its final series in autumn this year, the future of Dumbarton Studios, a cornerstone of Scotland’s creative industry, was under scrutiny.

Last year, Maureen Hascoet, director of independent production company Firewalker Pictures, enlisted the support of prominent figures in the Scottish television and film industry and set out to buy the studios to ensure they would continue in their current role.

Sam Heughan and Brian Cox were among the supporters of the campaign that secured £5 million in funding from a consortium of backers.

Despite nine months of discussions with the owners of the studios, the BBC and individuals from the creative industries, the studios, which comprised of the former Strathleven Bonded Warehouses and offices have now been sold to a developer.

They were opened officially by John McFall, pictured left,who was then the Dumbarton MP before he moved up to the House of Lords as Lord Alcluith, and Donalda MacKinnon, who was then part of the BBC Scotland management team.

Craig Watson, group property director at Westerwood Properties, owner of the property, confirmed that the site had been sold

“It’s a huge loss, it’s devastating. There is no other words,” Hascoet said.

“We’re losing all the external sets that could have been saved; there’s nothing else like that in Scotland. It could have been valued, cherished, nurtured, and it could have been turned into something that people could still use and visit. There were so many opportunities that are just now gone.”

River City’s executive producer Martin McCardie, confirmed last year that Shieldinch sets for River City were already in the process of being dismantled ahead of the final scenes being filmed for the long running drama in April this year:

“The reality here is we’re already decommissioning at the moment. We’ve been told, once a set is finished with, that’s it coming down. The aim is for that to be done very quickly to bring the backlot down and all the studios refurbished by September.”

Shieldinch was the fictional area used as the setting for the BBC Scotland soap opera River City, based on the real areas of Whiteinch and Shieldhall on opposite banks of the River Clyde.

The purpose-built backlot set in Dumbarton featured tenement blocks, a pub, a cafe and other local business locations.

The BBC’s first regular Scottish soap was announced in 2002, funded by a £14 million investment in regional programming announced by BBC director general Greg Dyke in November 2000.

One comment

Billie says:

February 4, 2026 at 12:11 am

Ok so the site has been sold and is going to be demolished for development.

So who has bought the site. And what do they intend to do with the site. The site will have been bought with a development in mind

So next question is what do the Council know about development. Have they granted planning in principal. Or have they just tipped the wink. Developers buy land with an intended use in mind.

Time we knew. And what brings a developer from Winchester in Hampshire up to Dumbarton.

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