Cine City Withington

[Sparkly]

Cine City / La Scala, 95 years old, and despite a reprieve a few years ago, is about to be demolished for flats and a ground floor store.

John admits cinema defeat - News - South Manchester Reporter
Curtain falls on historic cinema - News - South Manchester Reporter

I always find it a bit sad when an entertainment venue disappears.

Tameside Hippodrome also seems to be under threat. The council owned venue closes in April for 'repairs' and the management company have not renewed the lease.

[aidanorourke]

There is something fundamentally wrong with the way we are managing the city around us. Nearly everyone seems to agree that it would be better to retain a building like Cine City / La Scala, for many good reasons, and yet it is being destroyed. The end result is a city that's less interesting, less unique, with fewer reasons to remember it, or visit it. I can see this happening all around me all the time.

[regentroad5]

Even though I come from Salford,I was sorry when,on the bus to Oldham,I saw the old Roxy cinema being knocked down.I just thought there was something magical about that name that evoked a bygone age when cinemas were wonderful places of entertainment to visit,irrespective of what films were being shown.And now it's gone.Sad.

[daisy nook]

Why tear down a piece of social history that means so much to anyone who ever lived in Withington? Just what South Manchester needs-more flats and shops which will struggle to find tenants-there's dozens of vacant shops and to let houses in that part of Withington. The City Council just seems to let developers have their own way at the expense of everyone else and developer just go on bulldozing our heritage saying "it became structurally unsafe and had to be taken down" not suprising after 5 years with no maintainence! Of course the area is now bedsit land and hasn't any residents to protest about it anyway. Manchester will get the city it deserves.

[Andy Hilton]

I feel quite ambivalent about the demolition of Cine City.

I have fond memories of going there as a child but as it has fallen into disrepair it has become an eyesore. I would much rather that another use was found for the existing building, preferably something that the community would benefit from. I think Withington will be a poorer and certainly less interesting place when the Cinema is demolished.

There does seem to be a constant erosion of our architectural history/legacy within Manchester and it is a shame. As much as I love the City and it's surrounding environs; something needs to happen to reign the council and developers in before we lose the character that makes our city shine

[samorost]

I was disappointed to see the state of Cine City recently. It really is beyond repair. The big new cinemas don't have the atmosphere of our small local places.
Some photos here Manchester Exploration

[monstera]

I'd be a hypocrite to bemoan the loss of Cine City, as I lived 5 minutes walk from there in the mid 90's when it was reopened and despite intending to, I never got round to seeing a film there. No entertainment venue can survive without customers and it's last chance went when it closed for the last time circa 1998. Sometimes the happy coincidence of a great old building being married to a viable business just doesn't occur.