Great Western Coffee Shop

Plymouth has been chosen as one of eight cities to host a new hi-tech giant screen from the summer until 2018 (link below.)
http://thisisplymouth.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=181429&command=displayContent&sourceNode=229968&home=yes&more_nodeId1=133174&contentPK=20458663

Planning permission is currently being sought for the 30sq m screen, which will be installed in Plymouth city centre Piazza this summer - in time to show footage of the Beijing Olympic Games and Paralympic Games.

It is envisaged the screen will remain in place for up to six years following the London 2012 Olympics.

It will also bring a host of additional benefits to the city centre allowing the screen be a focal point for open air entertainment and cultural and sporting activities.

Open-air screenings of national theatre productions, sporting events and films are already planned as part of the Plymouth Summer Festival.

The coup is the result of a partnership between the London 2012 Organising Committee, through its Live Sites initiative, the BBC, Plymouth City Council and Plymouth City Centre Company.

David Draffan, managing director of Plymouth City Centre Company, said the screen will put Plymouth on the map and act as a focus for the Olympics in the run up to the 2012 games.

The screen will be half as large again as the 20sq m screen previously used during Wimbledon, and will be the largest of the eight screens being installed in towns and cities.

It will be installed at the southern end of the Armada Way Piazza, in a similar position to the Wimbledon screen.

Swindon has one of these as well. I'm organising a small literary festival there in a couple of weeks, and was asked to provide the "Swindon Initiative", who are behind the screen, as it were, with some film of the previous event we did to coincide with the launch - I get the feeling they must be short of material to display on there!

The gentleman I spoke to was Swindon's newly appointed cultural attache (my description, not his, but the job description fits his role rather neatly) - apparently funding's being provided not by the council, but by major local employers such as Honda and Nationwide, who are having trouble recruiting people, and are looking to him to big the town up somewhat. Apparently nobody wants to move to Swindon as it has an "image problem" - can't think why.

There was a lovely photo (sadly, not real, but manipulated in Photoshop) in the regional newspaper recently of an overhead monorail passing right through the city centre - their vision of how the future could look.

Pigs might fly too, of course.

(http://www.ffordeffiesta.com/images/skyrail.jpg)