We arrive in the post WW2 town of Livingston in West Lothian, Edinburgh, in the blink of an eye. Our last trip was of 103 miles, while travelling to Livingston was only a 15 mile walk. It's a strange sensation to think how many Livingstons there could have been on the way here, but we already accepted that we cannot visit them all.
Livingston town was designated in 1962 borrowing the name of a nearby village (currently Livingston village). This area was previously an important mining area for shale oil, and by 1870 over 3 million tons of shale were being mined around Livingston, but the mining drastically declined in the early 1900s, with the discovery of liquid oil reserves. The mining finally ceased in 1962, the same year of the creation of the town, due to the shale deposits running out. The 'bings'(accumulated wasted rock from mining) can still be found on much of the surrounding landscape of the town.
The creation of Livingston was part of a national program from UK Parliament called 'New Towns Act of 1946', which designated 4 other towns in Scotland: Cumbernauld, East Kilbride, Glenrothes, and Irvine. And 26 towns overall in the United Kingdom.
During it's development, Livingston was being managed by a QUANGO organisation (quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation) until 1997, when the town was transferred to West Lothian Council.
Being 30 miles(48 km) away from Glasgow and 15 (24 km) from Edinburgh, Livingston is the third largest town in Scotland. The town is comprised of 12 districts, Almond Valley being the center. The census in 2011 was of 50,826 inhabitants and had increased to 56,269 in 2011.
Interesting event:
In 1979, an employee of the Livingston Development Corporation claimed he was knocked unconscious after an alleged conflict with an UFO. Robert Taylor, who was in his sixties, was working as a Forester for LDC near Dechmont Law when the supposed incident took place. The incident was reported to the police, but nearly 40 years after taking place, the incident has never been resolved. It remains one of the UK's most notable claimed UFO sightings, being the only case of UFO sighting that was subject to a criminal investigation.
Links:
Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Taylor_incident)
Youtube - [Robert Taylor UFO Encounter]
[The Livingston UFO Attack of 1979]
Second stop in Scotland, Livingston.
This time we visited a skating facility, just out of curiosity, the dream facility would be one full of bars and equipment for calisthenics and fitness overall.
While walking in the city we saw the improbable happen, a skater overtaking a cyclist in broad daylight, then we followed him here in Livingston Skatepark.
Opened in 1981, a critical period for skateboarding, due to depreciation and closing of important facilities, it became an exemple of a free, unsupervised facility which achieved international status.
Some of us decided to give skating a try once they're back home. -but home ? where is home?
Now with a new thought stuck in our heads we went to the nearest shopping center, to research skateboard prices.
We arrived at the 'The Centre' mall in Livingston, built by the QUANGO Livingston Development Corporation in the 1970s in three phases, each one expanding on a specific aspect of the mall, such as modernization, new buildings, and the creation of different zones, giving the illusion of being outside, while still indoors.
The Centre is built like a small town, divided into five different zones: Elements Square, Wintergarden, The Avenue, Almondvale Walk and Almondvale Place.
We got lost there for a while, but luckily we didn't lose many miles.
Livingston has Zoos, many leisure and sport centers, parks, but we couldn't find anymore special visitor attractions, so we stuck with the scenery and the people. It probably has to do with the age of the town, it is probably the youngest we visited so far.
When getting into conversations with the natives they kept asking us what we thought of Livingston, it seemed like they were afraid to hear that it was the "cheating town of Scotland". We have heard rumors about that, but we sincerely think that that is a misunderstanding, we can't hold on to preconceptions such as this one, and in our experience there was nothing out of the ordinary, so we might as well take that from this city. But there is an explanation for that
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