Plummer House Demolition reveals new vista of Plummer Tower

18th century annex to Plummer Tower

Back in 2008, Newcastle City Council revealed plans and a public consultation on the redevelopment of the East Pilgrim Street Area of the City Centre - an area stretching eastwards from Pilgrim Street to the Central motorway, bordered by Durrant Street to the north and Swan House roundabout to the south.

This area had been identified by the council as a preferred location for the extension of the core shopping area of the City Centre. One of the objectives of the redevelopment was to improve the visibility and the setting of the many historic buildings in the area. I presume this would involve getting rid of a number of low quality, and lacking in merit, buildings dating from the back-end of the 20th Centurym, which tend to dominate and overshadow the historic buildings.

Plummer Tower is no exception. Hidden down a side street, jammed between Plummer House and New Croft Centre, Plummer Tower has been almost completely obscured by the surrounding buildings. Now that the rear block of Plummer House has been demolished, the 18th Century Annex to Plummer Tower can now be seen from Carliol Square.

I suspect, unfortunately, that this vista will be short-lived.  I think that the plans to build student accommodation on this site will again obscure this historic site.  The plans for the East Pilgrim Street development hit the buffers years ago, but its a shame if the vision for enhancing this visual setting of the historic buildings has been forgotten in the process.

Plummer House Demolition - more photos

I took some more photos yesterday of the demolition in progress of Plummer House.

http://novumcastellum.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/chapmans-plummer-house-demolition.html

oh, and apparently, Gareth is a C**T

The Tyne Four Bridge Challenge

Scorchio in Newcastle this week - too hot to be stuck in work, too hot to be stuck in the gym - better to get outside for a run. This week, I've been doing what i've terrmed the "Four Bridge Challenge" (the numeric value of the challenge is determined by the number of bridges over the Tyne, which have been crossed on a run, or the number of times a bridge has been crossed). It doesn't matter really, I just run different routes for variety, but the last couple of days I have ran the following route which i just over 3 miles: Worswick Street to the Tyne Bridge - across to the Gateshead side, past the Central pub, behind the Hilton hotel, to the High Level bridge then back across to Newcastle. Then up past the Central station to the Centre of Life to the Redheugh Bridge. After crossing the Redheugh to Gateshead again, down to the banks of the Tyne then on to the Swing Bridge. The Gateshead side of the Swing Bridge roughly marks the 3 mile mark. After crossing the Swing Bridge, I headed back to BodyZone gym on Carliol Square via the killer hill of Dean Street.

Today, I did the same route but couldn't really be arsed to run, so I took some pictures instead at various intervals on this route.

Former Bus Station, Worswick Street

Swing Bridge and Tyne Bridge viewed from High Level Bridge (from Newcastle side) 

Under the King Edward VII Railway bridge - Gateshead side

Under the Metro bridge (Gateshead side)

Metro Bridge (Gateshead Side)