PROGRESS is coming along nicely on the Bridge Street/Bank Street regeneration but I’m praying it won’t spoil one remaining pipe dream of mine.

The other side of a freak lottery win, the old ballroom at the former Lion Hotel would become ‘Magill’s’, a temple to live music, cheap sushi, fine whisky and a floor-to-ceiling humidor in a planetarium lounge.

Curiously enough there’s still a ‘to let’ sign for the premises, where I saw several bands back in the day, with reasonably-priced drinks in front of a roaring fire which would make any self-respecting health and safety officer wince.

And if space permitted, a discreet entrance could be created off New Market Walk, so my valued customers wouldn’t have to mingle with the riff-raff from Babylon or Reflex.

Perhaps it’s not exactly what the WBC hierarchy dreamed of when the Bridge Street Quarter came into being but you can’t buy class.

The flight-of-fancy came to mind after spotting a couple of workmen emerging from the former Carlton Club stairwell last weekend.

Hard to contemplate that a venue which once attracted the likes of Eric Clapton, Edwin Starr and Jackie Wilson, and saw off several musical fads, is turning into housing.

Until your correspondent overcomes his deep-seated ethical aversion to the lotto live bands must be the province of The Lounge, The Brew House, Porters, et al.

  •  Even after reading the Daily Mail cover-to-cover today, I still can’t summon up the righteous fury necessary to make it believable that the end of the world was nigh in Lymm at the weekend.

If two’s company, three’s a crowd and a dozen youths is a baying mob, you can perhaps comprehend the fear which prompted phone calls to Cheshire Police.

The word on the digital street was that the desperadoes who plagued the village had been turfed out of a house party.

And a dispersal order may have been the only workable option, in the circumstances. Certainly more realistic than getting police boots on the ground in sufficient numbers, given the borough’s other late-night commitments.

However the chances of ‘dispersing’ anyone – especially if the interlopers were from Altrincham or Partington as postulated – would surely have been vaguely comical given the public transport moratorium after dark in these parts.

Or if the problem persists you could always herd these young people into an appropriate location, say a ‘zone’, and offer them sporting, musical or recreational facilities.

  •  Motorists have never been looked on kindly by our power brokers. You only have to look at years of pedestrianisation, tortuous one-way systems and hawking off parts of Museum Street so the cops have somewhere convenient to park to realise that.

But an unexpected free gift has opened up at the top of Cairo Street, which even brightened Podium’s rain-lashed weekend.

Because from Mojo’s up to the old Barclay’s Bank, it’s a parking free-for-all, complete with shiny paving and a distinct lack of restrictions.

I’m sure it’s a Godsend to worshippers at the Unitarian Chapel and just as neat for bistro customers. Trust the loophole to close soon though.

  •  Knowing a fair few cystic fibrosis sufferers, through professional assignments, it was heartening to learn of Peter Trengove’s participation in new drug trials.

It was more than 17 years ago when I first interviewed him about his medical tribulations (and love of Doctor Who).

While it appears Peter and fellow sufferers are still at the mercy of cut-throat pharmaceutical giants, like so many others, his trial medication appears to be making real headway.