South Shields 365: The £100m Plan Reshaping the Town Centre and Riverside

If you have walked through South Shields town centre in recent years, you will have watched it change piece by piece. Much of that change sits under one banner: South Shields 365, a long-term partnership between South Tyneside Council and developer Muse to invest around £100m in the town centre and riverside over a phased programme. Here is a plain-English guide to what it covers and what residents can expect next.

The Word and the Market Place

The most visible result so far stands right in the heart of town. The Word, the National Centre for the Written Word, opened as the first major phase of the plan. Designed by Newcastle-based FaulknerBrowns Architects, the three-storey building near Ferry Street brought together a modern library and a digital media offer, with exhibition space, a FabLab with 3D printers, a children's storytelling area and digitised local archives. It overlooks the adjoining Market Place, which was refurbished at the same time to give the town a proper public square for markets and events.

Getting around: the transport interchange

Moving people to and around the town centre was always part of the vision. The town's £21m transport interchange on Keppel Street opened in 2019, bringing a modern bus station and the relocated Metro station together under one roof. It replaced the older, more piecemeal arrangement and made connections through the centre a good deal simpler.

What comes next on the riverside

The plan was always meant to unfold in stages, and the focus has increasingly shifted towards the waterfront. Work is underway to transform disused docks and brownfield land at Holborn into a new living and working quarter, with a residential scheme delivering hundreds of new homes, a renewed quay edge to tackle long-standing flooding, and a new river-edge promenade. Three former dry docks are being preserved to keep the riverside's industrial history in view. Future phases still point to an improved shopping and leisure offer alongside the homes.

For residents, the direction of travel is clear: more reasons to spend time by the Tyne, better public spaces, and a town centre gradually knitted back together. The detail of later phases is still being worked up, so the best source for timings and consultations is South Tyneside Council's South Shields 365 regeneration pages, where updates are published as schemes progress. It sits alongside neighbouring projects such as the refurbishment of the Customs House at Mill Dam, all pulling in the same direction.

---

Spotted something happening in your part of South Shields? Get in touch.