Many had concerns about the impact of the motorway on local communities, particularly in the Queens Cross and Bilsland Drive area. The plan above, from the 1965 Highway Plan, shows the initial proposal.

The Maryhill Motorway was one of the first motorways proposed in Glasgow's Highway Plan to be cancelled. Maryhill residents were outraged at the proposals to construct an urban motorway near their homes and by the early 1970s had launched a vociferous campaign against it. The construction of the Inner Ring Road through Charing Cross, and the impact it had on that area, only strengthened their resolve. In some cases songs were written about the struggle against the city planners in addition to protest marches and public petitions.

Public engagement exercises conducted by Scott Wilson Kirkpatrick and Holford & Associates were organised to listen to concerns. These were very well attended with over 3300 people taking part in one case, and officials from the Corporation Office of Public Works were on hand to ensure residents were able to put their points across.

Following these exercises a number of changes to the scheme were recommended in an attempt to limit the visual impact of the scheme on adjacent communities. Some sections of road were now planned to be in cuttings rather than on flyovers or viaducts and some junction layouts were modified to reduce land requirements and overall scale. These changes were accepted by the Corporation planning committee and incorporated into the project, however local residents remained opposed.

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Eventually a number of local councillors and Members of Parliament began to lobby against the construction of the route. With the creation of Strathclyde Regional Council in 1975 and a re-evaluation of the roads programme the scheme was ultimately dropped. New transport studies for the city did not include any routes through this corridor. The scheme was never part of the Scottish Development Department's road plans or their committed highway network.

The Maryhill scheme was noted as having a particularly high first year rate of return of 25% and was considered a high priority for completion. It was included within the Target 2 Network which was programmed from 1975 onwards. The effects of its cancellation can be felt today with chronic peak time congestion on Great Western Road, Maryhill Road and Balmore Road. The north western corner of the city has a distinct lack of road capacity with few, if any, enhancements made in the last half century. The large, wealthy suburban towns of Bearsden and Milngavie remain disconnected from the motorway system..

It has been argued that the Maryhill Motorway, combined with the Lomond and North Link Motorways is perhaps the “most needed” of any cancelled scheme from the Highway Plan. Some argue its construction would result in traffic benefits across a large part of the city, taking traffic away from the M8 in the city centre. This is extremely unlikely to happen, the construction of urban motorways adjacent to particularly deprived areas with low car ownership being particularly difficult to justify. In hindsight perhaps an expressway class road would have been most appropriate in this location and would not have resulted in the same negative reaction.