SBC have admitted over capacity of retail units and have grasped the nettle and are demolishing the Castlegate shopping centre and adjoining Swallow hotel and moving business over the road Wellington Square Centre.
When will Hartlepool follow?

Not to Wellington Square Centre that is..... more like Church Street and adjoining streets.

Wonder how much the new houses are going to cost, on the riverside.

High street shopping will never return to what it once was. As soon as the public and powers that be accept this and convert retail properties into housing or something else useful the better.

Stockton’s High Street was ruined when the planners moved in with new road layouts that killed the market off and that idiotic Wellington square which moved shops from the High Street to a glorified back Street and when they’d cocked it up declared it as a performance area, there”s no money in mime artists.

I understand this sounds really negative and entitled, but this is an abhorrent idea in my eyes. I really hope it's another pie in the sky (and yes, they are launched from Teesside International Airport). I actually like the Castlegate, it's near the bus stops, the connections to the bridge are useful for people who work/study over the river and last time I checked it didn't have a vacant unit either (except those weird ones near the large entrance which has two floors and connects to a car park).

As for the Swallow, what a waste, it'd be awesome if they could renova...oh wait, they just decided to build another hotel for the sake of building one. I guess you could say the Swallow sucks?

So basically the Castlegate now becomes a park? Jesus...hope the PM was correct about boosting police recruitment, at least Stockton will be like it's California namesake, it'll have a "pill park" of its own. And what about Riverside Road? You're going to make a road even smaller in a town with brutal congestion?

And even after all this, Stockton has, and always will be in Middlesbrough's shadow. Sad but true. Middlesbrough has more shops, more people, and more services, I can't count how many times I've been given a "local" appointment and it's in Middlesbrough. Investing money into Stockton is literally beating a dead horse, especially a radical investment like the one they're thinking of. And that above point is regardless of the condition of British high streets anyway.

Is asking for a government that invests money into it's vulnerable people opposed to radical business plans too much to ask?

I'm too young to remember, but everyone older than me concurs with this point.

think the public realise this but most councils just cannot get their heads round the fact. its shops, shops and shops and bringing up plans that were shelved 10 years ago when things started to decline. present day town centres have had their day. 200 years ago they did not exist anyway and times and habits are changing.

Middlesbrough? Really?
I used to take the cars through to a main dealers for their service in Middlesbrough. They’d drive you into Middlesbrough for 9 am and pick you up four hours later. Try spending a midweek morning in Middlesbrough for four hours by yourself. Newcastle no problem, but Middlesbrough

Your forgetting one thing theres money to be made for certain people.

With the small stretch of land between Middlesbrough and Stockton being gradually developed, I’m not sure you can say they are different places any more. That’s if they ever were. Take the river away and its one town.

middlesbrough and stockton on market days are what her indoors call 2 hour towns. thats the maximum needed for parking to have a look round the place.

Club Fiesta Stockton.. did i have my first Chicken in the basket meal there??

My first experience of chicken in a basket was that the gravy finished up all over the floor.
Daftest idea I've ever experienced.

Stockton had one thing going for it, the market. Years ago people in the area went regularly to Stockton and Darlington markets generally just for a run out and the all day drinking. Now everywhere has a market, Peterlee,Billingham, you name it, it has a market. Now people go to Teesside Park, Dalton Park or the Metro centre whilst the younger generation hammer the internet.

Information about what....? Why there are no shops and just ‘information hubs’ in the ‘shopping’ centre.
Listen, forget fecking WiFi, buy a dog, get down the beach on a windy day and experience what life’s really about.

Information about what....? Why there are no shops and just ‘information hubs’ in the ‘shopping’ centre.
Listen, forget fecking WiFi, buy a dog, get down the beach on a windy day and experience what life’s really about.[/quote]
spot on. been up the moors today in the poaring rain and wind. both me and my husky will have gained more from this than bleeding WiFi.

Apparently Church street is getting some more student accommodation to occupy the vacant units.

Town and City Centres all over the place are struggling, in part because so much is now available online for less - and unless you really can't wait for next day delivery, why go to the shops? The ones that do OK are clothes (easier to try things on before you buy), and places that are a bit more unusual - where you can find the sort of thing you won't find elsewhere. Even then, it sometimes depends on what else is around.... Where I live is fairly small, but it benefits from the fact that there's not too many of the larger chains - so there's plenty of Cafes etc. but the only chain one is Costa, a fairly recent arrival; there's several clothing stores, but the only chain one is M and Co; there are supermarkets, but none of them are massive. No chain bakeries etc. It's also quite a distance to a large retail development (half hour drive minimum). It gives the place a certain atmosphere that makes it feel a bit more unique than the typical high street; even so, there's a fair number of empty shops on the edges, and about 5 Charity Shops.

Markets are not what they were in many places, I remember going round Billingham Market every Monday for a while and there were certain stalls that always caught my eye - but to be honest it feels like the Pound Shops, B&M, Home Bargains etc. have really eaten their lunch in many places. On my local one here the Cheese stall used to be superb - a good range, including stuff you'd normally have to g oto a Deli for (Sage Derby, Yarg, that sort of stuff) - it's now selling nothing you can't get cheaper in Tesco; the same is happening with a lot of stalls. The ones that tend to thrive specialise more and build up a customer base - taking on the supermarkets at their own game is a hiding to nothing.

think you have covered most of the stuff about town centres. what gets me about them in larger towns is that they all look and feel the same with all the same shops etc. out of town shopping places are even worse apart from getting free parking.

With every town an identikit copy of the every other town at least on holiday the wife says no point in visiting town X as they’re all the same shops in them, then you get to see something decent elsewhere that avoids retail therapy.

Before the licensing laws changed places like Stockton and Darlington on Market Days were always very busy as the pubs were open all day.

Also as in most cases nowadays shopping is a one stop at a supermarket as most married both work long gone are the days when only the husband worked and the wife did all the shopping round the markets etc.