The rapid rise and fall of Gateshead's 1960s-built Trinity Square is well-chronicled.
But when this image was captured 50 years ago, hopes were still high for the recently-built shopping centre and its adjoining multi-storey car park. In the event, the complex failed to prosper and decline came relatively quickly.
In some ways, the demise of the area seemed almost a perfect fit for the downbeat narrative that had long surrounded Gateshead. Historically, the town had had its detractors. The famous Dr Johnson in the 18th century dismissed it as “a dirty lane leading to Newcastle”. Two centuries later, in 1934, the writer JB Priestley wrote “no true civilisation could have produced such a town”, adding that it appeared to have been designed “by an enemy of the human race”.
