Coronation Street in 1981 1981 was " Coronation Street " ' s twenty - second year . Production . Bill Podmore produced " Coronation Street " for the sixth year in a row . After his successful introduction in 1979 , William Tarmey returned for a longer stint as Jack Duckworth , testing the waters for his eventual full - time role starting in 1983 . Amanda Barrie was seen in four episodes as Alma Sedgewick , initially Elsie Tanner ' s overbearing boss at Jim ' s Cafe . She would be seen occasionally before joining full - time in 1989 . Aside from that , there were no major cast changes . Late in the year , the decision was taken to replace the outdoor Grape Street set with a new purpose - built set , which would be larger in scale , have proper roofs with fibreglass chimneys , and have space for a section of Rosamund Street to be built . The location chosen for the new set was a former railway marshalling yard opposite the bonded warehouse at Tickle Street , Camp Street and Garden Court , close to the studios . The houses were built from bricks reclaimed from demolition sites , and the roofs from reclaimed slates , although the cobbles were already in place . Construction began on 12th November 1981 , after a ceremony conducted by Doris Speed , and continued into 1982 . Within storylines , the programme began preparing for the new set with Episode 2155 on 25th November , when Len Fairclough bought the ground rent of No . 7 , which had collapsed in 1965 , and started building a new house in the space . The completion of the house was timed to coincide with the programme transferring to the new set , which was built with a finished No . 7 . Although frequently mentioned , due to the size of the Grape Street set none of the building work was seen . Viewing figures . " Coronation Street " continued to gain traction , increasing its overall rating for the third year in a row . Its average viewing figure was 15 . 88 million viewers , the second highest average of the decade after 1985 , and the top rated episode - 2075 on 18th February which gained 20 . 8 million viewers - was the highest peak since 1977 and the first episode of the programme to gain more than twenty million viewers since 1978 . Across the year , the first eight months saw increases from the same months in 1980 , with May , July and August gaining by more than 10 % . In the weekly viewing charts , 32 episodes reached number one - 18 higher than in 1980 , and the most since 1968 . An ongoing myth is that more viewers watched Episode 2120 ( Ken and Deirdre ' s wedding ) than tuned into the real - life Royal Wedding two days later of Prince Charles to Lady Diana Spencer . This story came about because the official television figures were for the average number of viewers throughout the duration of the state occasion . The wedding figures for the three channels ' multi - hour coverage was 13 , 700 , 000 for BBC1 , putting them in 3rd place , and 8 , 000 , 000 for ITV but the actual ceremony itself attracted 19 , 000 , 000 for BBC1 , 9 , 000 , 000 for ITV and 400 , 000 on BBC2 , which carried subtitles for the hard of hearing . In second place for the week was coverage of the Royal Fireworks on BBC1 on 28th July which garnered 15 , 100 , 000 viewers . Who lives where . Coronation Street Rosamund Street Others