Curly's Corner Shop, the blog!

About our town centre

A few little searches of this blog will take you to one or two posts where I have expressed similar worries and concerns to those reported by Mr. David MacLean in this evening’s Shields Gazette. I don’t want to bore my readers by recanting the whole heap here and now, but it is worth giving you a little poke in the ribs about one or two things.

A shoppers parking scheme can work and provide two hours of free parking in South Shields town centre, and by working in close partnership with the town’s traders will guarantee them custom and share the proceeds in a manner which sees the cash passing through the coffers of South Tyneside Council, the retailers, and the shoppers. Parking rates for those staying in excess of two hours can be progressive enough to discourage the all day parking bay hog. Why not get in touch with Harrogate Council and find out how their scheme in the historic town of Ripon operates?

The market is dying on it’s feet, does it need a new manager/supervisor? Someone with flair, ability, and imagination as well as the energy and drive to attract more than a steady core of tired traders. Some of your ideas are good and bring to mind the very successful market held in Tynemouth Metro Station at the weekends, but we need more. Perhaps you should be looking to use discounts for future block bookings of stalls. We also need to beef up the Christmas offer and our market traders could play a pivotal role here, I have often expressed my desire to see a Grassington style Christmas Market in our Edwardian Market Place and foresee that such an attraction would cement South Shields place as a tourist magnet for the North-East.

You talk of the importance of linking the new Asda store and Waterloo Square with the Market Place and King Street, an idea that I have floated here in the past is the creation of a retail village intended solely for local independent traders of great variety, a speciality niche market, in the Barrington Street and Chapter Row area. Go see Olive Street and Vine Street in Sunderland for a good well presented and marketed example. Old Durham Road in Gateshead is also an example of a flourishing street with very few national chains hogging the retail frontage.

Having mentioned Asda it’s worth promoting one or two ideas for the use of their present building in Ocean Road it could be broken into four good sized retail units with windows facing on to it’s FREE car park, it may make an ideal replacement for the InShops which were lost in Jarrow, it may be possible to revert to it’s former use as a cinema, but whatever is decided is best for it’s future it needs to be actioned NOW! Leaving the building empty for months on end will spell disaster!

Finally, please ensure that enforcement action is taken against those who have set up roadside car sales rooms in the Fowler Street/Westoe Road area, they make our town centre look like down town Harare or Havana, and their presence is not conducive to rebuilding retail confidence. Perhaps I should have reminded the ward councillor to keep me updated, but I understand that his busy schedule has been rudely interrupted by a war in the middle east.

I am passionate about South Shields and the major role it plays in South Tyneside’s economy, the well being of our town centre is very indicative of the state of our local economy and reflects our confidence and ability to adapt to change and face challenges with enthusiasm. I would urge you to look seriously at some of these ideas with your officers and advise you not to delay.

If you waiver or procrastinate you can be sure that the “policy-lite” South Tyneside Independent Alliance councillors will thieve the ideas and claim them as their own – then nothing at all will happen!

Related Posts

• We need free parking
• “Holding it’s own”
• Town centre in crisis
• Massive storm in a tea cup

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