A DARLINGTON auction house founded in 1840 could move out of the town centre.
Peter Robinson, who runs the Thomas Watson saleroom in Northumberland Street, is applying for planning permission to build a new auction room on Yarm Road industrial estate, south of Dudley Road and close to the proposed cross-town route from the A66.
The auctioneer and valuer said the company had bought the vacant 1-acre site with an eye to the future..
"We have other warehouse accommodation in the town we need to vacate, but this is what quite a lot of auctioneers have done because of difficulties with loading and parking.
"The council is now talking about putting parking meters in Northumberland Street."
If planning permission is granted, the transition would be a gradual one.
"We would probably take the more valuable and smaller items in Northumberland Street to start with and the larger, house clearance and less valuable ones to the new premises, where there would be plenty of parking space.
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