Grange Hill closes with 518,000

BBC1's Grange Hill

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The last ever episode of the BBC's long-running children's show Grange Hill closed its gates yesterday with 518,000 viewers (5.2% share) at 4.35pm.

The 25-minute programme, which saw Todd Carty reprise his role as Tucker Jenkins, hit a high of 591,000 (5.7%) at the end.

The last ever episode marks an end of an era in children's drama programming as the show originally aired in 1978 featuring characters such as Mrs McClusky and Mr Robson as well as Tucker.

Yesterday's show was in line with the programme's average audience this year of half a million.

The children's programme managed to gain a slender advantage over Five's film The Wrong Girl. Between 3.10pm and 5pm, the 1999 film starring Barbara Mandrell averaged 498,000 (6.3%).

All the other terrestrial channels managed to break the million mark. BBC2's Step Up to the Plate at 4.30pm appealed to 1.1m (10.8%) for half an hour while a repeat of A Touch of Frost at 4pm on ITV1 was slightly ahead on 1.3m (13.6%). Top dog at the time though was Channel 4's game show Deal or No Deal which pulled in 1.8m (18.8%) for 45-minutes from 4.15pm.

C4 was in a weaker position in the key 9pm slot in peaktime as the second part of The Price of Property trailed the terrestrial pack with just 1.1m (4.6%). It was then shown an hour later on C4+1 which attracted a further 48,000.

Five's Extreme Fishing with Robson Green at 9pm kept on a largely even keel at the time with 1.2m (4.9%) over the hour-long slot, on par with the opening edition on 1 September.

The appeal of explorer Bruce Parry hasn't started to wane just yet as his new series Amazon kicked off last night at 9pm with an impressive 3.2m (13.5%). The audience steadily rose over the hour and hit a high of 3.4m (13.5%) in the final 15-minutes.

ITV1's critically-acclaimed three-part drama The Children largely held on to its audience over its run as last night's finale picked up 4.7m (19.7%), a decline of just 200,000 from the opening episode on 1 September.

BBC1's New Tricks though was the most popular show at the time though with a repeat episode from the third series on 5.4m (22.9%).

The usual plethora of soaps on a Monday night all made steady, if unspectacular, progress. The first outing of the day of Coronation Street set the pace at 7.30pm with 8.7m (41%) with the second show an hour later on 8.6m (36.2%). BBC1's EastEnders at 8pm managed 8.3m (35.8%).

What to Eat Now, BBC2's new food and cookery show, got off to a steady start at 8.30pm on 2.4m (9.9%). The show was only a little way behind BBC1's Panorama which gained 2.6m (11%).

C4's Dispatches programme What's in Your Wine? at 8pm drew 1.4m (6%) with a further 70,000 watching on C4+1. Five's motoring show Fifth Gear took 1m (4.3%).

All hours shares for Monday 15 September 2008: BBC1 – 22.3%, ITV1 – 18.9%, BBC2 – 8.7%, C4 – 6.5% (C4+1 – 0.5%), Five – 4.8%, multichannel – 38.3%.