mackembulldog
Striker
The metro system has made Sunderland an awkward cul-de-sac in railway terms. Sunderland connected to the east coast mainline only through Newcastle is scandalous. It's restricted trains. Sunderland's connectivity both road and rail needs to be independently developed to the south through the Durham coast line. Our main focus needs to promoted without the Tyne and Wear link. The incorporation of the Tyne and Wear metro....to err.....Wearside has made Sunderland a conceptual suburb of "Tyneside". The metro doesn't serve us, remember the majority was made along existing rail track at the turn of the millennium. It didnt make connected useful routes across wearside. Rather it was a cheap bolt on addition to a Newcastle-centric system, that took commerce from Sunderland and inhibited train services.
Sunderland needs to think more independently to the "Tyne and Wear project" that has always been a bad deal for Sunderland
Our future is away from this unequal partnership
Develop road and rail services including a train station south of the city centre.
Ps Well done to the council leaders acknowledging the city centre has been 'hollowed out' over the last few decades and bringing jobs and homes to the city centre as a priority. That idea needs to be commended
Totally agree with this. Ive been exiled since 89 and have always wanted to return (soon hopefully. Its a shame to say but its like living in Gillingham and travelling to London (or Canterbury) to actually enjoy an evening out for a meal/drink etc... (which Im sure isn't the case, I just don't know the town anymore).
I'd love to see Sunderland (as a town/city) move out of the shadow of the Tyne (and I say this begrudgingly) and become a City that can deliver on multiple fronts and be somewhere people WANT to come rather than having to rely on somewhere up the road.