Alistair

But if the uni is going to H&S risk assess it in that way - then why design it like that?!

'Lets give the student rooms Juliet balconies so they can see the excellent views and circulate air'
'Should they be able to open it more than two inches?'
'Absolutely not'

Would anyone like to club together and buy a concrete car park?

As it happened: RAF Scampton asylum camp plan to go ahead after High Court ruling The Home Office plans to house up to 2,000 asylum seekers at the former home of the Dambusters.

There was a live blog of a high court planning ruling, but not the actual committee:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk...

Not pictured: The nice Thai place behind here, where I'd just had dinner

If only they'd cleaned their own signs

Are the benches facing away from the pub for the people who hate Tetley's?

Yep! Good taste in sign photography

Currently mostly maintaining social distance due to having melted into a small puddle

You can also narrow down some UK cities by bus livery (what, you haven't memorised which of the big operators runs in which cities?).

Mysteriously unblurred on Yandex, obv.

For the economic development/deindustrialisation fans, here's what happened to all those private employers:

A potential pub crawl of Newcastle Inns pubs based on their proximity to Metro stations

If you've read all that, how about this Metro-themed pub crawl? I'll see you at the Raby /end

The cover of 'The Metro Report'

All this analysis was done in 1984 as part of 'The Metro Report', a post-implementation evaluation of the Metro (🥳). This was all done just prior to subsequent reorganisations abolishing the County Council in 1986 and deregulating bus services in 1985.
9/

A chart of property prices by Metro line - increases on the two lines away from the river Tyne

We can see a bit of the 1980-4 economic malaise in the reductions in property values along the lines either side of the Tyne, where much of the industry was. Lines going north from Newcastle did better and showed growth 8/

A charge of patronage between 1980 and 1984, showing patronage going up

Up to 1984, things looked like they were going well for ridership. Metro journeys were on the up, bucking national trends, and then hitting 59m in 1986.
All despite T&W's population *reducing* by 2.3% 1979-1984 and a 16.6% *decrease* in the number of jobs.
Patronage has never been as high since 7/

Pie charts of journeys to workplaces by large Tyneside employers in 1980 and 1983

Modal splits of shopping trips to centres in Tyneside, before and after the Metro

A before/after of journeys to work for some big employers - interesting that of the private sector employers, only Clarke Chapman remains (after being bought and then sold by Rolls Royce).
For shopping trips to Newcastle, Metro is taking a big bite out of bus mode share. 6/

Metro-related travel times, with very significant savings between Bank Foot and South Shields

Isochrones of changes in employment access- showing increases in employment catchments in Newcastle and North Tyneside.

It could do this because the Metro delivered big savings on public transport journey times - particularly those that involved going over the bridges. This increased significantly jobs available within 20-40 minutes from the city centre 5/

A large graphic of changes to bus services in Tyne and Wear - showing reductions over the bridges

A large graphic of changes to bus services in central Newcastle - showing reductions over the bridges

The transport system didn't keep running as before - there were major changes to bus routes to align them with the Metro and also big *reductions* in bus services between Gateshead and Newcastle, to reduce duplication with Metro. You can see this in the Newcastle traffic counts. 4/

Total costs of T&W Metro construction

A description of text saying that the County Council agree that almost all capital investment should be devoted to the Metro system

What did it cost? £179m in 1975 prices, which the BoE calculator has at ~£1,400m in 2025 prices.
It was only delivered after the County Council agreed to commit almost all its capital investment in transport to the project so as to ensure it got finished 3/

A schematic showing the gradual opening of the T&W Metro

A picture collage of major Metro opening times

For fans of 'how long it takes to build things'.
1968: Tyne/Wear Land Use Transport Study
1972: 75% grant for system costs
1973: Parliamentary approval for construction
1974: First contracts let
1980: First section opens
1984: Final part of initial network opens
2/

A metro train at Haymarket Metro station

Happy 45th birthday to the Tyne and Wear Metro! First paying passengers travelled on this day in 1980. In honour of my local transport system, a bit of a 🧵 about it 1/

If one of these is signs for defunct regeneration agencies I riot

Please do not apply if you are independent, only if you are independant.

Getting to complain at people on TV about not understanding local dialects? Great stuff, A+

The yellow-y one's planning application has it with a glazed ceramic cladding. Which is, as you say, not very brutalist.

Watching Destination X as it was intended (by pondering about the challenges of complying with European tinted window regulations)

In an update to 'importing coals to Newcastle', I think this ship may be importing wood pellets to Newcastle from Latvia to fuel power stations

Bonus very low resolution dolphins also put me in a good mood

A segregated cycle path

A segregated cycle path

It was nice walking along the new North Tyneside seafront sustainable route this afternoon and seeing the route complete and well-used