This week a UK wide study of deprivation was published. It ranked areas over 40 years using data from each census from 1971 to 2011.

It divided the whole country into grids of one square kilometre and used data of unemployment overcrowding and car ownership, known as the Townsend Score for deprivation and ranked every one.

The area that came out top as consistently the most deprived was Possilpark.

Read more:Possilpark: Most deprived in Britain 'neglected and abandoned' - but not giving up

Not just the most deprived in Glasgow, or Scotland but the UK as a whole.

Yes, on those measurements more deprived than parts of inner London, Manchester, Liverpool and poverty hotspots in Middlesbrough and Newcastle.

This came as no surprise to the people who live and work there. It came as no real surprise to me. It is an area I am more than familiar with.

In the time period between those censuses Possilpark has seen huge changes, few for the better.

One of the local traders said the area has been “abandoned and forgotten”.

Big employers shut up shop and people were put out of work and little was done to replace them. Community centres were closed and many local groups and regular activities ceased to exist.

Schools were closed then demolished. The secondary was first, then primary schools were next to go.

Entire streets were cleared of sub standard housing and people moved out of the area where they wanted to live.

Today there are streets with the roads and lampposts intact but in place of the houses is overgrown wasteland.

In some cases, it is decades, approaching 30 years of dereliction.

There is new housing. It is far better than what it replaced but the overall appearance is one of derelict and overgrown sites.

Most of the old Possilpark Secondary school site is wasteland. A new Health Centre stands on part of it.

In fact, there are many new health facilities. They exist because the health inequality in the areas is enormous.

The building of new health centres is a sign of the neglect and decay of the area and a lack of investment in the preceding decades.

Three primary school sites, within a few minutes of each other, two of them side by side, have lain derelict for years.

Decisions were taken to demolish and leave large eyesore wastelands in the middle of communities with no plan for what will go in their place and no regard for the people who live in those communities. Abandoned and forgotten, indeed.

Possilpark is not without its problems, the ranking makes that clear, but there is and always has been plenty of people who want improvements and want to work to make it better to live in.

People in Possilpark watched while hundreds of millions of pounds was pumped into the regeneration of the riverside.

The looked on while the Commonwealth Games brought serious and long overdue investment in the east end.

They see the regeneration of the south side of the River having a knock-on effect in parts of Govan.

The European Championships and a demolition programme is transforming Sighthill a mile or so up Keppochhill Road.

Each time they wondered, when is it our turn?