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cracking snap of Bedlington Station and of the Black Bridge getting Built. i bet some people will get a shock when they look. that it was orginal made of wood. http://erniesphotos.fotopic.net/c813556.html

Have to disagree, Win98 was bad, 98SE was miles better, Millenium was a poor attempt at an April fools joke, Windows 2000 was the launchpad to get people off 16 bit software and onto meatier systems and taking responsibility for permissions, then in the background a pesky little penguin was gaining ground in the free legal market although diversified into different distros, some were popular some weren't. Have used desktop OS's from Dos up to WIndows 7 with MS, and have tried almost every flavour of Linux (anyone else used to order from polo.demon.co.uk/emporium ?) Suse was ok, Mandrake was resource hungry (although could have been my machine) and then Ubuntu came from nowhere and now lives happily as my main OS of choice, I rarely boot into MS unless I am testing something for work. /end of pointless post

Chained up in his kennel :lol:

wey could they not use a different building? like the holding cells at the police station :lol:

I don't think it is quite that black and white Merc. I understand what you are saying and in a lot of ways agree but I still think there are options. If this whole development goes ahead, and its going to be early next year when we finally find out, I think it will inevitable adversely effect a lot of businesses in the town not to mention anyone thinking of opening a retail shop one here. The simple fact that as a large national Tesco monitors it's through sale per square footage closely and therefore will cheery pick only those goods which sell well and they can make a profit on. Course the rest of the independents do much the same thing but cannot hope to compete with either the costings or attraction a unit like a large Tesco will have. On the plus side if it does become a superstore people will be able to buy things which until then haven't been available in the town. That has got to be good news and might address the question of the large numbers of potentially local shoppers who never use Front Street. An increase of footfall should stimulate interest by other shops and offices bidding to exploit that potential, as long as the whole thing is managed properly. I think Jim's posting illustrates the way things could develop if left to drift as they always have done here. Without a clear and ambitious programme for future commercial development of the town as a whole we will certainly run the risk of seeing the piecemeal and ad hoc 'improvements' we have been used to for the last 30 years continue and even that could be drawing to a close given current market and budgetary tends.

Dragged away in the dead of night by Mrs and Mr Vic and fed to the dogs, that's what. Quite right, too. A good deterrent. i mean, how dare anyone voice a dissenting opinion! I like this site for its wide ranging views: Monsta with simple and straight to the point claims, Darn with idealistic romantic visions, Malcolm with an educated view that we should all take more notice of and the G's with their brand of well read opinionism. And me, with a load of nonsense. It works.

I think it's already happened, Malcolm. A few years back I got into a discussion about the Tesco store and was shot down in flames as I seemed alone in proposing that it was, in fact, the worst thing that could happen to the town. Bedlington has no through traffic, and tesco in the market place will never have enough 'draw' to justify its existence in teh long run. tesco opens and closes stores at will - it can afford to - and I remain convinced that the proposed development of the adjacent building will never happen, and that the store itself has a short life ahead of it. people were adamant that I 'didn't understand women' (something I found quite insulting to women) as they would 'flock' to this new store for the sheer excitement of shopping somewhere new. Replying that this was, in absolutel essence, utter b*llocks I was laughed at and told I would be proved wrong. I haven't been proved wrong - where is the megastore selling white goods and so on? Who the hell is going to go out of their way to come to bedlington to buy a fridge freezer? The smaller shops have already been driven away, the presence of tesco can't even justify the presence of one of the countries major banks - wake up bedlington, tesco will be gone by 2012.

I think the point here is that Joe and Jane Bedlington stumped up £2M to tart up the area in front of their store, and so make it a more attractive place to stop/shop, and then (allegedly) they wouldn't stump up a measly grand toward the launch - which they must have got some direct benefit from too. Some figures about how much such stores contribute or leech from local economies would make interesting reading. I wonder if the people making planning decisions have access to these sorts of figures?

Possibly a sign that there are not the visitors they wanted. This developement was ratified prior to the recession so it could be hitting hard. I have been to have a look at it and yes, its nice, but I really thought it would be more impressive than it is after all the 'hype'. Its still a lot better than the forgotten Shire (BEDLINGTONSHIRE) . Hopefully we can catch up. I remember Morpeth over 10 years years ago when things were run down and many shops empty and shut. It hasnt taken them long to get it how it is now. We should take a leaf from their book of redevelopment and follow suite. COUNCILLORS/MP's should be ashamed of themselves allowing Bedlington to become the forgotten land and should start rectifying things with money other than hand outs and lottery grants

couple more images ive found http://steamingback.fotopic.net/p47075401.html http://steamingback.fotopic.net/p47075403.html