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Sunderland market to make history
Medieval laws that have prevented a market being established in Sunderland city centre will be skirted this weekend.
Park Lane will host a farmers' market on Saturday, with more than a dozen traders offering North East produce including cheese, jams, free-range poultry, organic vegetables and game.
A second market will be held next month and it is hoped they will become a regular fixture.
Previous proposals have been scuppered by a medieval law which bans a market within a day's donkey ride – about six and two-thirds miles – of an existing market held under royal charter.
South Shields was given permission to hold a market in the 1200s – and South Tyneside Borough Council has used the law to bar a market in Sunderland city centre.
Talks with potential market operators have been under way for some time but had been threatened by the possibility of a legal challenge from South Tyneside, because any operator's public liability insurance would be invalid if a market was not being held legally.
But city centre manager Louise Hardy said she was confident the latest move would not fall foul of the centuries-old law.
"We have decided to go to Park Lane because it is outside the market charter limit, outside the six and two-thirds mile rule," she said. "That's why this particular location was chosen.
"We are looking at running regular markets in the city centre – we have two planned initially and we hope they will prove sufficiently popular that it is worth establishing them as a regular fixture, both from the traders' point of view and the customers' point of view."
The North East Chamber of Commerce's Sunderland committee led the drive to reintroduce markets in the city centre. Committee chairman Mick Thurlbeck said he was delighted to find the campaign bearing fruit: "I am very pleased. Now we need to get behind this."
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Weather for Sunderland
Tuesday 07 February 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: -3 C to 6 C
Wind Speed: 9 mph
Wind direction: South west
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: -2 C to 1 C
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