The money comes through the Cities Growth Fund aimed at regenerating tourism infrastructure and traders had hoped the cash would fund improvements additional to the spend already pledged by the council.

Councillor Billy Hendry, convener of the development and environment committee, welcomed the funding boost last week and said: "The council will continue to work in partnership with local traders and with the town centre steering group to deliver improvements which will encourage a renewed sense of civic pride in our town centres."

But shortly after the statement was issued the steering group meeting scheduled for last Tuesday was cancelled — causing anger not just over the cancellation but over the secrecy that surrounded it. The only explanation given was that "operational issues" had led to the call-off.

Denied the opportunity the meeting would have provided to hear how the new money would be spent, traders asked the Herald to enquire about its disbursement.

The reponse from the council was: "The additional money will allow us to move forward at a quicker pace with delivering on the Milngavie Town Centre strategy, which includes work like improvements to signage, street furniture and underpasses.

"It will also enable us to further investigate the provision of a permanent visitor information centre in the area."

The reaction to that was all-round disappointment and surprise that any further investigation was required.

Councillor Eric Gotts said: "Investigations have been carried out and there was pretty broad consensus that the principle of a tourist centre was desirable — and only funding was preventing the establishment of one.

"The old beer store near the Fraser Centre, owned by the council, was identified as a good location and now that we have more funding I can't see why we can't go ahead and kit it out as a tourist office.

"This is the kind of thing that could have been ironed out had the town centre steering meeting not been cancelled.

"No satisfactory explanations are being given as to why meetings are being cancelled — even to councillors or representatives of bodies like the community council and the Civic Trust — not to mention the traders.

"We shouldn't be going down the road of secrecy — it breeds ill-feeling. No wonder the traders and residents feel so badly let down."
Traders spokesman Ian Lavrie insisted: "Decisions on how the additional money can be spent must only be made in consultation with the traders and community groups."

Mr Lavrie said a tourist office was high on the list of priorities for the village and added that since the beer store had already been identified as a suitable location traders hoped the tourism regeneration cash would be used to have it operational as soon as possible.