BLACKBURN'S landmark £10million bridge is to be named by Lancashire Telegraph readers.

The bridge, in Freckleton Street, is due for completion this summer and has already had a dramatic impact on the skyline.

Bosses at Blackburn with Darwen Council have come up with a shortlist of seven famous names from Blackburn's past.

And they want Lancashire Telegraph readers to make the final decision.

Readers can also put forward alternative suggestions if they don't agree with the shortlist.

Council executives and senior councillors along with Blackburn MP Jack Straw put the list together.

The council said the list has names of people who were non-political and who have not already had anything named after them.

Work began on the 800-tonne steel structure last September.

The dual carriageway will form part of £12million scheme to transform the area, with a new road creating a link from Bolton Road to Barbara Castle Way.

A naming ceremony will be held later in the summer.

Council leader Colin Rigby said: "The bridge will be used for future generations to come.

"It is a fitting tribute for a well known personality who has contributed so much to Blackburn."

Coun Alan Cottam, executive member for regener-ation, added: "The bridge will be one of the most notable landmarks in Blackburn and is a sign of all the major regeneration going on in the borough."

Chief executive Graham Burgess said: "The names have been given a lot of thought but if readers decide they don't want to pick from the list we have selected, they can vote for their own choice.

THE CANDIDATES

William Fox was the chairman of Blackburn Rovers for 19 years and president of the Football League at the time of his death in December 1991 aged 63. He had been a supporter of Rovers since his childhood and was elected to the board of directors in June 1976.

Kathleen Ferrier came to prominence as a singer during and immediately after the Second World War and was especially remembered for her courageous performances during her illness. In 1953 she made her final performance. Already ill with breast cancer, which had spread to her bones, she got through the opening night of Orfeo in Covent Garden successfully, but at the second performance a bone in her leg broke while she was on stage.

Robert Edward Hart waps the treasurer of several local organisations - Blackburn Orphanage, Blackburn Guardian Society and the Church Mission to the Jews for the deanery. He was a great benefactor to the town and gave money for the purchase of Witton Park and set up scholarships and endowments. He possessed a collection of old coins, early printed books and illuminated manuscripts. His collection was left to the town on his death in 1946. Commemorated by the Hart Gallery, in Blackburn Museum and Art Gallery.

Thomas Boys Lewis is best known for giving the Lewis Textile Museum to the town in 1934, which showed the development of the cotton industry over 200 years. He was also active in the preservation of Samlesbury Hall. He was born in Blackburn in 1869 and educated at Eton and King's College, Cambridge. He taught Latin and Greek at the Technical College in Blackburn as an unpaid teacher and he was a Governor of Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School for many years.

Alfred Wainwright was born in Audley Range, Blackburn in 1907. He is most famous for the large number of walking guides he wrote of the Lakeland fells, accompanied by his own hand-drawn maps. Always a private man, he disliked being photographed or interviewed. All the money he made from his writings was given to animal charities. He was educated at Blakey Moor School and went on to work in the borough treasurer's office.

Ethel Carnie was a working class poet who found fame through her writings on the factories that surrounded her home in Rishton. Born on January 1, 1886, in Oswaldtwistle and daughter of cotton weavers David and Louisa. By the age of 11 she was a "half-timer", employed as a teacher and also working at St Lawrence Mill as a winder. She identified herself with the working classes and became a member of the Blackburn Independent Labour Party in 1908.

Mary Hamilton has a varied career in public life serving as Blackburn's MP for two years from 1929 as well as a governor of the BBC from 1932-36. She was educated at Newnham College, Cambridge, where she joined the National Union of Women Suffrage Societies. She later joined the Independent Labour Party. During the Second World War she was head of the American Division of the Ministry of Information.

HOW TO VOTE

Simply type your choice of name for the bridge in the box below.

You can vote for any of the names mentioned above, or add your own choice.

The decision of Lancashire Telegraph readers will be final.