There were several schemes in the early part of the 1800s, with the Glasgow Company which was established in 1806 pumping filtered water from the River Clyde into the city.

However, an outbreak of cholera in 1848/1849, in which 4,000 people died, concentrated the minds of Glasgow Council, and in 1855 a scheme to use water from Loch Katrine, 36 miles (58 km) to the north, was authorised.

They took advice from the Scottish inventor and mechanical engineer James Watt, and plans for a water treatment works on the north bank of the River Clyde were drawn up by Telford.

Although the filtering was not particularly efficient, the system lasted for 30 years, and provided 3 million imperial gallons (14 Ml) per day on average, with the amount available depending on the river level.

[2] The civil engineer and statistician James Cleland produced a report in 1813, on a scheme for raising and distributing water, and building public baths,[3] and there was a flurry of activity in the 1830s.

[2] The first was a scheme to exploit the waters of Loch Lubnaig, in the River Callender catchment, some 80 miles (130 km) to the north of Glasgow.

[2] The engineer Nathaniel Beardmore moved to London in 1843, where he collaborated with James Meadows Rendel on a project for the Glasgow Gravitation Water Company.

The engineer for the scheme was William Gale, who supervised the construction of the works and two earth dams to impound the water, at Waulkmill Glen and Ryat Linn.

[9] In 1852 there was an attempt to revive the Loch Lubnaig scheme, but this was opposed in Parliament by Glasgow Council, and in this they were assisted by the civil engineer John Frederick Bateman.

Having defeated the bill, they asked Bateman for advice on a suitable water supply, and he favoured the Loch Katrine scheme.

[10][9] Compared to the massive earth dams that were being built to supply Edinburgh with water at a similar time, the reservoir works for the Loch Katrine scheme were rather modest.

The Act allowed 50 million imperial gallons (230 Ml) per day to be taken into the water supply, but in order to maintain flows on the river system below it, the outlet of Loch Venachar was also modified, so that it could be controlled to supply 40.5 million imperial gallons (184 Ml) of compensation water per day.

The service reservoir at Mugdock held 548 million imperial gallons (2,490 Ml), and from there it was conveyed into the city through twin 36-inch (910 mm) pipes.

[9] The aqueduct includes 70 tunnels, with one just south of Loch Katrine being 2,325 yards (2,126 m) long and 600 feet (183 m) below the land surface at its deepest point.

[14] Gale chose a more direct route for the new aqueduct, which involved more tunnelling, but by this time pneumatic drills and better explosives were available, and he felt that the long bridges such as that at Duchray were the least satisfactory element of the original design.

Work started on 1 May 1896 and it was completed on 11 June 1896, but there were problems with leakage, and a deep trench was cut to resolve the issue, so it was not operational until 1 January 1897.

Construction of a dam across the River Turk to impound water in Glen Finglas and excavation of a connecting tunnel to Loch Katrine was authorised by an Act of 1903, but little work was done due to the start of the First World War.

By the time hostilities ceased, construction costs had risen significantly, and the project was deferred, with the tunnel finally being completed in 1958 and the dam in 1965.

[19] Under the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973, the functions of the water boards were taken over by regional councils, who were also given responsibility for sewerage and sewage treatment.

[9] The need for a new works was highlighted in August 2002, when following the 2002 Glasgow floods, the waterborne parasite cryptosporidium was found in the Mugdock reservoir, and 140,000 people had to boil their water before drinking it, until the problem could be eradicated.

The works was formally opened by Queen Elizabeth and won the 2007 Utility Industry Achievement Award, having been completed ahead of its time schedule and for £10 million less than its budgeted cost.

[23] Since the publication of Edwin Chadwick's Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Population of Great Britain in 1842, there had been a growing understanding that the health of people in cities depended both on a clean water supply and an efficient method of disposal and treatment of sewage, to prevent the occurrence of waterborne diseases such as cholera.

The liquor passed into 24 settling tanks, each able to hold 81,000 imperial gallons (368,000 L), was aerated, and then entered 60 coke filters, which covered an area of 3 acres (1.2 ha).

[26] A Cunmor drying plant was then installed, and the sludge cakes were marketed as "Globe Fertiliser", with sales reaching 32,000 tons per year by 1911.

[27] The sewerage infrastructure was improved significantly in 2017, with the completion of a tunnel 3.1 miles (5.0 km) long, which provides 20 million imperial gallons (90 Ml) of storm water storage.

Dalmarnock was able to maintain the service from Glasgow, as the sludge was dumped near Loch Long, rather than near the Isle of Bute, due to the presence of a defence boom across the Firth of Clyde near Dunoon.