Canny Bevvy

Problems with marquee in a park would be obtaining a premises licence and the probability the council would specify plastic glasses. Oh, and rain! (see Peterborough Festival for details)
Gateshead Stadium would have legs (no pun intended) if it had better public transport links, i.e. it was closer to it's Metro station and the bus service didn't go all round the world getting there. Again, licensing and security problems.
As for Civic Centre, Cider Bum, send me a quote for a full week next April (if it's available) and we'll consider it, subject to a site inspection. I still have my doubts, however.

Having checked the City Council website, I can rule out the Banqueting Hall and indeed every other Council owned venue on capacity grounds. The Banqueting Hall has a capacity of 600 compared to our current 1000 at the Union Society, so would at least mean longer queues and even longer waits to get in, that is of course not withstanding any objections the council might have to scaffolding, beer spillage etc in their beautiful Civic Centre.

Joined : 04 Jun 2007 Posts : 1

Another year and yet again time constraints fail to allow me to visit the festival Mad

Maybe next year. I myself could not personally think of anywhere else in Newcastle that the festival could be held. If Gateshead Stadium were used, to me, it would be the Gateshead beer festival, not Newcaslte, which in itself would be a great shame.

If the festival were to move to Gateshead it wouldn't go down the evil path of being the NewcastleGateshead festival (i.e. all one word merging as our "culture masters" would have us believe). I've already got the ideal title should such a move be neccessary - the Tyneside Canny Bevvy Beer Festival.

If the festival were to move to Gateshead it wouldn't go down the evil path of being the NewcastleGateshead festival (i.e. all one word merging as our "culture masters" would have us believe). I've already got the ideal title should such a move be neccessary - the Tyneside Canny Bevvy Beer Festival.

No no no no and NO..... That's definitely one place I wouldn't want the festival to move to. It's the NEWCASTLE beer festival so that is where it MUST stay. Granted that it is growing out of its current venue, I think a suitable new location will be found within the city and not interfered with by these 'culture' people. The university has and will continue to do a fantastic job of hosting the event in the meantime.

Unfortunately, one of the realities that must be faced is that if the festival has to find a bigger venue it might have to be somewhere other than the City Centre or indeed Newcastle as a whole. It's organised by the TYNESIDE & NORTHUMBERLAND Branch of CAMRA, we're not just the Newcastle branch - there's nothing to say that we can't hold a festival anywhere in our branch area, including Gateshead. If Newcastle as a city doesn't have suitably sized venues at a reasonable hire charge then that is a problem for the city to solve.
I know for certain that the beer festival isn't the only such event that has possibly had to look at neighbouring authorities with better and reasonably priced venues, some indeed have already made the switch "over the river". All Newcastle's loss to Gateshead's gain I'm afraid.
However, I do agree, it just wouldn't seem the same to hold it anywhere other than Newcastle.