On any given night, Glasgow's Sauchiehall Street is filled with a throng of people, from students going clubbing to people enjoying a pint.

However, yards away from the pubs and clubs runs a dark, partially unlit lane where 167 crimes have occurred in the past five years, including four sexual assaults.

Campaigners and locals say Sauchiehall Lane, and other dark and badly-lit alleys like it in the city centre, can be dangerous - especially for women.

But efforts to improve the narrow side streets has stalled due to their piecemeal ownership - where dozens of separate landlords and businesses only have responsibility for very small parts of each lane.

"Street lighting will not suddenly stop sexual violence, but it's basic safety and not something that we should be highlighting as a problem years after it's already been established as a problem," says Nicola Love, of Rape Crisis Scotland.

Sauchiehall Lane is about half a mile long and it is owned by dozens of businesses or landlords. They only have responsibility for the area around their property.

While some owners have made sure to have lighting, a walk through the lane at night shows parts in darkness.

Two rapes were reported in the lane over the past two years, with the victims in both cases being women under 20.

Em Johnson has lived in a flat overlooking part of Sauchiehall Lane since 2024.

They contacted BBC Scotland News through Your Voice and said: "It's a very studenty area, there's a lot of places you'd go for a night out on Sauchiehall Street, and then you cut down the lane.

"There's student housing around there, loads of international students, and you have young people who can be vulnerable, maybe having had a drink.

"It is very dark at night - there are bits with some lights but other parts where there isn't. Sometimes I'll hear a scream and you're never sure what's happening, if it's just someone having a good time on a night out or if it's something serious."

Other parts of the city centre have the same issue, such as West Regent Lane.

Glasgow City Council has attempted to encourage lane owners to take further responsibility, but told BBC Scotland intervening any further faces "significant challenges" due to the piecemeal ownership.

Christy Mearns, a councillor for the Anderston/City/Yorkhill ward, has been trying to make headway on the issue for years.

"The council does not have the money to take on things that should be the responsibility of the owners themselves, but the problem is ownership of these lanes is very fragmented and disjointed," she says.

"There does need to be more work done there, especially given a number of serious incidents there with young women.

"These are important lanes for access, and security and safety issues arise as a result of that, so how can we facilitate private owners into doing more? But it is challenging, even just trying to get majority agreement among owners."

The city council does take responsibility for some lighting within private lanes, but only "on a lamp, lantern and minor fault basis".

"Something more significant, like rewiring, is out of scope for the council's remit," adds Mearns, who says this happened recently with West Regent Lane.

"It would be costly and the council simply doesn't have the budget to take on that burden."

The city council previously stated in 2022 it was committed to "feminist town planning".

This is intended as a response to the way cities have been traditionally designed by men, ignoring things that would concern women in the process - such as a lack of lighting in public spaces.

Love feels such a commitment requires actual action to be taken, not just words.

"We know that women will purposely avoid badly lit and secluded areas because they do not feel safe, and that feels like such a step backwards.

"There seems to be a tussle over who is responsible for it. Where it's a council, get to work. Where it's a private business, we should be thinking about ways that we can legally compel building owners to pull their weight.

"I can't understand why building owners would rather pass the buck than work together to find a solution. It's such a simple ask from women and it shouldn't be so difficult to get this right for them."

Mearns agrees with that, but feels it's impossible to "point the finger at any one person or agency".

"Some owners may be absent or not occupying the properties in some cases. That also talks to another problem, which is the difficulty of having many absentee landlords.

"There are very high value landlords in some of these spaces that clearly don't care very much."

Issues with Glasgow's lanes are not new - in 2006 it was proposed to close some lanes at certain times using temporary barriers, to keep people on brightly lit main streets. Those plans came to nothing.

A spokesperson for Glasgow City Council said the local authority is currently working with Police Scotland and the business community on ways to improve the situation.

Police Scotland's Ch Supt Emma Croft said the force is striving "to deliver prevention and education, to enhance visibility and engagement and to improve support to women and girls within communities and to those who are sadly victims of crime."

Some changes are in development. A recent council meeting saw an agreement that private lane toolkits - which help property owners work together on joint action regarding adjoining lanes - will "form the basis for a new framework for city centre lanes".

Johnson hopes steps like that will take effect sooner rather than later.

"I understand it's difficult to sort things like this. But sometimes it can feel like no-one cares about this."