2010

NZ2564 : New Bridge Street and Blue Carpet Square

taken 15 years ago, near to Gateshead, England

New Bridge Street and Blue Carpet Square
New Bridge Street and Blue Carpet Square
The new Central Library on John Dobson Street is the building with green glass in the distance. The Laing Art Gallery is hidden by the modern office block to the right of the 'carpet'. John Dobson's House is the white building next to the entrance to the Liquid nightclub below. Oxford Street is below, right. This photo was taken from the upper level walkway above Oxford Street's Premier Inn. The wooden balustrade in the foreground is on the curved steps which provide access NZ2564 : Steps from New Bridge Street to walkway
Two level toon

A 1960s vision for Newcastle City Centre to separate traffic from pedestrians by creating a network of concrete walkways above access roads and traffic routes of the existing streets.
Geography reverses the situation somewhat at the Swan House roundabout which merges traffic coming off the Tyne Bridge with that from the Central Motorway and the City Centre. Here pedestrians are moved below the roads in subways but emerge again above the deep valley of Side under the Tyne Bridge.
The vision would have included Northumberland Street (where some new stores were built with shop windows at what is now first floor level), and further, but eventually money ran out and it was realised that too much of architectural merit would have to be sacrificed.
The development of the city in the 1960s and 1970s was marred by a corruption scandal involving a local politician, T. Dan Smith (aka 'The Mouth of the Tyne), and John Poulson, a property developer. Echoes of the scandal were revisited in the late 1990s in the BBC TV mini-series, 'Our Friends in the North' LinkExternal link
The 'streets in the sky' concept is explained in the Urban Translation Tour LinkExternal link
Plans of this and other Newcastle developments are discussed here LinkExternal link


Creative Commons Licence [Some Rights Reserved]   © Copyright Andrew Curtis and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.
Category: Square
This photo is linked from: Automatic Clusters: · Building that Houses [74] · John Dobson [38] · Laing Art Gallery [25] · John Dobson's House [11] ·
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NZ2564, 1022 images   (more nearby 🔍)
Photographer
Andrew Curtis   (more nearby)
Date Taken
Friday, 15 January, 2010   (more nearby)
Submitted
Thursday, 21 January, 2010
Subject Location
OSGB36: geotagged! NZ 2514 6451 [10m precision]
WGS84: 54:58.4744N 1:36.5271W
Camera Location
OSGB36: geotagged! NZ 2520 6450
View Direction
WEST (about 270 degrees)
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Image classification(about): Geograph
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