Plans to ban traffic from one of the busiest streets in Newcastle city centre are still on the table, council bosses say.

Newcastle City Council previously shelved proposals to pedestrianise Blackett Street in 2022, after lengthy debate over its future and arguments with bus operators.

But councillors were told last week that the idea has not been ditched for good.The Northern Echo:

The vision to create a vehicle-free version of the route, which is busy with buses and taxis, had been in the works for years as part of aims to make the city centre a cleaner and greener environment.

Blackett Street, which passes Grey’s Monument and the Eldon Square shopping centre, has been named among the worst locations in Newcastle for air pollution in recent years and the local authority had secured a multi-million pound Government Levelling Up Fund (LUF) grant for its redevelopment.

Those plans were put on ice in 2022, following a power shift at the civic centre that saw Nick Kemp replace Nick Forbes as council leader, with officials saying at the time that it had been “deferred until such time as it can be fully funded and brought forward as part of a comprehensive package of measures”.The Northern Echo:

Asked about the future of the pedestrianisation idea last week, council cabinet member Marion Williams said: “I don’t think it has left the table. We are just looking for the opportunity to look again.”

The Labour councillor, recently appointed as the council’s cabinet member for transport, told the authority’s overview and scrutiny that Blackett Street “has to be part of the discussion” around redesigning the city centre – particularly given its proximity to the huge HMRC office building under construction on Pilgrim Street, which is set to bring in thousands more commuters every day.

The pedestrianisation of Blackett Street, as well as a revamp of Old Eldon Square, was meant to be paid for through more than £10 million of LUF cash.

But that money has since been reallocated by the council to neighbouring Northumberland Street instead, where it will be spent on a range of measures to reinvigorate Newcastle’s main shopping thoroughfare – including a series of 50ft lighting towers paying homage to the wooden poles that guide people across the causeway to Holy Island.

Blackett Street was temporarily made into a vehicle-free zone during popular summer events and for the city’s 2019 Christmas markets.

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While supporters said that a permanent pedestrianisation would better promote walking and cycling, there were fears about potential congestion caused by pushing buses onto a new loop around the city centre and making access harder for elderly and disabled people. 

Bus company Stagecoach, the main objector to the plans and whose opposition meant a public inquiry would have been required if they were to proceed, had claimed to have lost 120,000 passengers when Blackett Street was shut in winter 2019.

700 people responded to an online council survey about the plans – with 287 objecting, 276 in support, and 137 undecided.