I WRITE this in a traffic jam on the way from White Hart Lane. What a great finish to the season.

Graeme Souness and his team really deserve their - and our - success - not least because Rovers cannot compete with the resources available to the big city clubs, nor with their gates.

And for once, Manchester United did us a favour. The atmosphere - though nothing like as electric - reminded me of the great day in 1995 at Anfield when our fate then (Champions or not), as today, depended on others as much as on us. So, as in 1995, there was my son next to me with a radio stuck to his ear giving our part of the stand a running commentary on the Goodison Park game.

Whilst Ewood, the home of Rovers, has been doing fine, Ewood the home for many people in town has seen a few problems recently.

Not all of the Ewood area by any means, but earlier in the year residents in the Infirmary area raised with me a lot of "quality of life" issues.

There were two murders - unlinked but still very disturbing, anxieties about the number of asylum seekers, about juvenile and other crime - and general concern about the future of the area. To deal with this I called a residents' meeting in the community centre at the end of February.

Somewhat to my surprise more than 200 residents came along - so many that some had to be turned away. The new police chief Dave Mallaby, and the council chief executive Phil Watson and local councillors were there with me.

I arranged a follow-up meeting - for three months later (now fixed for 6th June). Last Friday lunchtime I saw the council leader Bill Taylor and the chief executive to run through what has been done by the council and police since February.

There is, I think, fair progress to report - though whether that has yet filtered through to residents is an important question. Along with levels of crime and disturbance, it's uncertainty which can really get people down. So it will be good to report on two things which were worrying residents.

One is over the purchase and clearance of some pre-1919 terraced property in Mosley Street. The second is over the future of the Royal Infirmary site, once all its NHS functions are transferred in a few years to the new buildings at Queens Park. Blackburn Royal Infirmary has been a good hospital, but for a modern car-dominated world, in the wrong place - as residential streets in the neighbourhood have had inappropriately to cope with hundreds of vehicles of staff and visitors to BRI.

The residents I've spoken to say, therefore, that they do not want the BRI buildings used for some other institutional use, and instead that the site would be best devoted to good quality housing.

Happily, the council takes a similar view. The infirmary site has been designated as a residential area which emphasises housing as the main use. This does not mean that this is definitely how the site will be used. It depends on planning procedures and law; on to whom the NHS Trust sells; and especially on what the residents as a whole want (on a more scientific basis than my conversations).

But converting the fine original Victorian buildings into good quality residential accommodation, and building new on the remainder of the site might be one option. If we did that, the whole area would get a lift.

Either would be more to celebrate in Ewood.