The system was designed to provide greater connectivity and faster journey times between Glasgow City Centre and the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Govan, as well as to several other key developments along the north and south banks of the Clyde Waterfront.
The route was chosen in order to better-connect major transport hubs in the city centre to the new Queen Elizabeth Hospital, serve the burgeoning Clyde corridor on both sides of the river, and to better connect the underserved communities of Govan and Linthouse.
Additionally, the project fell significantly short of the initial proposal, which had called for a "tram on wheels" type vehicle to be used with off-board ticketing, similar to those on Belfast's Glider system and said to be capable of providing service levels of up to 12 buses per hour at peak times.
Privately owned bus companies McGill's and Stagecoach now compete for passengers along the route, using regular low-floor buses which must at minimum comply with Euro 6 emission standards.
[13] In October 2015, local news outlets reported that bus operators on the Fastlink route had advised drivers to avoid using the lanes, due to heavy delays caused by faulty priority signalling.
The removal of this service means that no operators now serve the entire originally proposed route for Fastlink, which ran in a city centre loop past Buchanan bus station, before heading south towards the Broomielaw.