In York, a city of traditional pubs, millions of pounds are being spent on modern wine bars. DAN RUTSTEIN takes a look at why everyone

wants to sell booze in the city.

UNISEX toilets. In two weeks time yet another major company will be opening its chrome double doors and inviting York's men and women to drink at its new bar and visit its toilet - together.

Who would have imagined that a drinking circuit consisting of York's historic inns would be complemented by the unisex toilets of a huge riverside complex?

But that is what it happening in the form of Bar 38, the latest in a series of highly-priced wine bars to enter York - set to open to the public in a fanfare of fireworks in the first week of August. It is a £1 million investment which will generate 72 full-time and part time jobs.

But why here, and why now?

"York is really taking off," explains Helen Cook, assistant manager in the Ha Ha Bar and Canteen, a £500,000 development on New Street.

"York needed to change, to move with the times and the big companies have recognised that and are keen to open in the city."

The Slug and Lettuce opened the flood gates back in 1997, the Pitcher and Piano, Varsity, Ha Ha and Bar 38 have since followed.

And these new bars are doing remarkably well.

The Pitcher and Piano, a massive two-storey hulk of a bar, seems to be crammed with eager punters nearly every night of the week.

More remarkably, perhaps, Yorkshire drinkers are prepared to pay London prices in these places - and do so all night.

Despite the new bars openly hoping to attract "more upmarket" drinkers with "exclusive pricing" policies, the cost of the drinks is failing to put off the customers.

It seems that the new drinking face of York is covered in make-up and aftershave and is accompanied by a wad of disposable income.

The wages up here don't match London, but now the prices do.

There is a lot of money to be made in these bars, and as York residents are keen to spend, so the bars will keep coming and with high profit margins too - why else invest hundreds of thousands of pounds?

Food - a reliable money spinner - is pumped out of the kitchens all day long, the offer of credit card facilities brings in the business people as does the reliable service and clean tables. The sale of bottled beer and lager keeps the cash flowing with their low maintenance time and high prices, the open spaces and long windows ensure the female clientele are not put off, and the young, bright graduates managing the bar have the marketing experience to match their salaries.

Perhaps some atmosphere is lost in these places but the familiar names encourage tourists, used to the Slugs and Lettuces in their own town, to come and spend their holiday cash in the York version.

And it is a positive cycle. The more places that open, the more are encouraged to move into the city.

Some of the profits may well be going to companies based elsewhere, as has much of the construction work on these places - preferring to use the company bar-fitter not the local one.

But there are many employment opportunities being created by companies which often make a point of investing in training and paying that little bit more.

Traditionalists have one straw to cling to - York Brewery's first public house, Last Drop Inn, soon to open in Colliergate - but I've seen the future. And it's wine-coloured.

PICTURE: The changing face of the public house in York: no smoky, dim-lit corners -light and airy rooms are the norm, as the Pitcher and Piano

demonstrates.