Riverside Museum: Attraction has proved to be a hit. Pic: © STV
Scotland's new transport musem has attracted more than half a million visitors in its first seven weeks.
Around 10,000 people have passed through the Riverside Museum in Glasgow each day since it opened on June 21. The museum has more than 3000 exhibits, including cars, trains, bicycles and historic streets.
Designed by Zaha Hadid, the building replaces the former Museum of Transport at the Kelvin Hall. In just over seven weeks, the Riverside Museum has welcomed almost half the number of visitors many top attractions see in a year.
Over the course of 2010, Edinburgh Castle attracted more than 1.2 million people while Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow drew in just over a million, according to figures from the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions.
Councillor Gordon Matheson, leader of Glasgow City Council, said: "The Riverside Museum has been a huge hit since the day it opened to the public. We knew just how much visitors loved the Museum of Transport at Kelvin Hall but even so, the reaction to the Riverside Museum has been phenomenal.
"The feedback from people has been overwhelmingly positive and we are already seeing visitors returning time and again to enjoy Glasgow's latest attraction."
The museum's busiest day so far was June 25, when more than 15,000 people passed through its doors. The visitors who tipped the museum over the 500,000 mark were Ronnie and Jannette Kerr and their children Joanna, 7, and Elizabeth, 8, who were there on August 11.
The family, from Aberdour in Fife, received gifts from the museum shop and will be invited for a meal in the restaurant to mark their visit.
Mr Kerr said: "This was a real surprise and I am absolutely delighted. My dad worked in the yards at Yarrows and I would have loved to have shown him round here. It is a fantastic building and they have done a great job. I have been to the old museums at Kelvin Hall and Albert Drive but this building is something else. We really enjoyed our visit."
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