Normally, the area around Monument is a major bus route, but the last two summers the council has been blocking this street off to all traffic at weekends and NE1 has been rolling out the green carpet and handing it over to people. This year, a green ‘guerrilla’, deck chairs, beanbags, picnic benches, a carousel and all sorts of other random things fill the street. And what a difference it makes; individuals, couples, families out shopping, eating, enjoying the weather! Of course it helped that it was a bank holiday, 24 degrees and barely a cloud in the sky, but I think not having to constantly beware of buses hurtling through threatening to make you into a pancake helps too. Add to this an outdoor cinema, market and gardens also set up in the surrounding streets, and you’ve got a city centre that’s bursting with life.
NE1’s goal is to promote Newcastle’s city centre businesses, so there are clearly commercial reasons for all this – more people in town means more people spending money in shops, hotels, bars and restaurants. But while the motivation may be economic, the result (at least on a hot bank holiday) was a place that’s simply a pleasure to be in.
When I had more time to waste, I used to do a lot of wandering and a lot of urban photography – the two went together well. You can see some of my earlier photography here. I haven’t done this nearly as much in recent years, but with my wife off doing a photo shoot with friends and a few hours to kill, Saturday offered a good opportunity to get reacquainted with our city and take some pics.
From the hustle and bustle of the guerrilla, green carpet and gardens around Monument, it’s a short walk down Grey Street, a spectacular neo-classical thoroughfare once voted the best in the UK, to the equally impressive historic quayside nestled beneath the Tyne Bridge. This area, if you ask me, has a few too many boozers, and on a bank holiday weekend like this there are always stag and hen parties spilling out onto the streets half-dressed in ridiculous costumes at various stages of drunken stupor. At least during the day they don’t usually cause too much trouble.
Cross the river to Gateshead, and on the bit of quayside made (in)famous by “the boat” there’s now By the River Brew Co., which has been there for over a year now but last weekend was the first time I’d gotten around to taking a look. While temporary, intentionally rusty (‘industrial chic’) shipping container ‘villages’ have become a bit of a fad (Newcastle hasn’t escaped – we’ve got one right at the bottom of Northumberland Street), they do bring to life often otherwise neglected areas. This one seems to have a good atmosphere, and if there’s one place this ought to work, surely a once industrial quayside has to be it!
Walking past the Sage music centre and Baltic art gallery to cross the Millennium Bridge, I up back on the Newcastle side. This bit of Newcastle’s quayside is quite a contrast to rusty shipping containers. The 90s and early 2000s development is smart and clean and it’s a pleasant place to be – but it’s just a little bit … sterile; a bit corporate. Still, on a day like this there’s not much to complain about – the place is heaving with people, the ‘Quayside Seaside’ succeeds in injecting some fun and informality, and there really is no other city with a view quite like this. I know I’m biased, but I don’t think there’s anywhere that beats it!
CUBE 