20th June 2012 Prudhoe Town Centre Development Approved

Readers here will know that the Prudhoe Town Centre has been chatted about here and in the real world for years. On 20th June 2012 Northumberland West Area Planning Committe finally gave it the go ahead. I have misgivings about THIS development but fully recognise developmental change is inevitable one way or another. The best summary I have of where things lie comes in the comments a Prudhoe councillor put on his facebook. Neil Bradbury said "

So the town centre application has gone through finally. I always suspected it would as the planning rules are not about whether you like something or not but whether it is broadly within the guidelines which, mostly, this is. There have been mixed reactions from "FINALLY we might get a decent supermarket" to "That's the end of Prudhoe".

What we have to do now is pull together as a community and make the best of the town and of the development by working with Northumbrian estates. I will be doing that and think that this town has a great future."

That is exactly it, the community must go forward and recent events like the Prudhoe Diamond Jubilee Street Party showed with panache what Prudhoe can achieve. I do find myself drawn to what Neil said about "broadly...mostly" . The sense I have that the plan is somewhat at a tangent to what would provide Prudhoe with a really excellent solution rather than a multi storey car park jutting out of  a hillside and towering over nearby homes is well expressed in that.

What is for sure is that all the years passed are but a beginning. Now the years of change in the heart of Prudhoe really start. To that end and recognising that an existing Facebook page Take Pride in Prudhoe has been hi-jacked I have created a new one Take Pride in Prudhoe (2012). I never managed the original one. I do the new one and I will ensure it remains an open place to talk about the subject. I shall positively manage it to allow all opinions to be heard without it becoming abusive and it will with my steer reflect my non-party partizan ethos.