Google Sightseeing takes you on tour of the world as seen from satellite, using the free Google Earth program, or Google Maps in your web browser. Each weekday your guides James and Alex present new weird and wonderful sights as suggested by readers.

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Glasgow Science Centre and the Glasgow Tower

Posted by Alex Turnbull, Thursday, 6th December 2007

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Built on the site of the 1988 Glasgow Garden Festival, the Glasgow Science Centre is a purpose-built facility featuring three floors dedicated to hands-on science in action. Taking the form of a huge, gleaming, titanium crescent overlooking the Clyde, the building is also home to the best-equipped planetarium in the UK.

As if that wasn’t enough, just to the south we can see the silver dome of Scotland’s only IMAX cinema1, which has a screen larger than a 5-a-side football pitch, and a 12,000-watt digital sound system.

Most impressive of all from up here however, is the 127 metre-tall Glasgow Tower. This is the tallest floored building in Scotland, and the tallest building in the world which can rotate through a full 360 degrees!

Technically the tower is actually an aerofoil (like an aeroplane wing stood on one end), which is rotated into the wind by computers – allowing it to be exceptionally slim for its height. Impressive stuff, and I hear the views are not bad too.

Thanks to Martin Deutsch. More about the Glasgow Science Centre, the Glasgow Tower and the IMAX film format at, you guessed it, Wikipedia.


  1. Yes, we are deprived. 

2 Responses to 'Glasgow Science Centre and the Glasgow Tower'

  1. Flümo says:

    Heh, that look familiar… :-)

    Did they recylce some plans from Paris?

  2. Alex says:

    Cool! This is the first time I am see them from this angle.

    Nice! Something fresh.

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