Call for Micklegate to get major facelift on back of scheme to reopen city centre screen (From York Press)

Call for Micklegate to get major facelift on back of scheme to reopen city centre screen

5:09pm Tuesday 19th June 2007 in News By Gavin Aitchison, gavin.aitchison@thepress.co.uk

THE reopening of York's Odeon should be the springboard for the regeneration of the city centre, a councillor said today.

Julie Gunnell, newly-elected Labour councillor for Micklegate ward, said the street of Micklegate should be revamped to once again become the "premier entrance into the city."

She wants City of York Council to work with local firms and organisations to help develop the whole area.

As reported in The Press on Saturday, the Odeon in Blossom Street is to become a cinema once more, after being bought by Reel Cinema, sparking widespread delight in the city.

The announcement marked a long-awaited victory for The Press's Save The Odeon campaign, which called for the historic cinema to be refurbished.

Coun Gunnell said today: "One of our policies in the recent election was to get the council to help to regenerate the area around Micklegate itself.

"The council needs to work with local traders and estate agents, to get Micklegate going as a lively, vibrant street again, attractive to shoppers, families and visitors. With the new owners' plans to refurbish the Odeon, this is the ideal time to tackle the whole issue of again making Micklegate the premier entrance into the city."

Her fellow Micklegate councillors, Dave Merrett and Sandy Fraser, also welcomed the new plans.

Coun Merrett said: "It is excellent news that it is to be again operated as a cinema. There has been real concern in the area that, although the current planning use is only for leisure, it might be converted to yet more expensive flats and apartments, or some vast chain public house."

Coun Fraser added: "This is very good news as the cinema served the area for young people and those without their own transport, who find it difficult to get out to Clifton Moor to the other mainstream cinema.

"We have also been concerned about the eyesore that the current building has become and an attraction for nuisance behaviour. We will be pleased to see the back of the unsightly shuttering."

Coun Fraser and Coun Merrett, and Coun Gunnell's predecessor, Dave Evans, had all supported The Press's campaign and helped collect signatures opposing the closure of the Odeon.