Now I am pretty excited at what has become known as the Northern Hub and especially since the release of a short video on how it will transform some of our railway stations.*
It was first announced in 2009, and is a series of upgrades which would cut journey times between cities in Northern England by alleviating the rail bottleneck through Manchester.
“Central to the project will be resolving the rail bottleneck through Manchester city centre to allow more routes, more capacity and quicker journey times across the Northern cities.
Two new through platforms at Piccadilly will allow 14 trains per hour (up from 10 currently) through Manchester city centre allowing more routes and trains.
Manchester Victoria station will be modernised as the east-west rail interchange in Northern England.
Trains from the north east to Manchester Airport will use a new section of railway, the £85 million Ordsall Chord, between Manchester Victoria and Manchester Oxford Road to reach Manchester Piccadilly and continue to the Airport without reversing at Piccadilly and without conflicting movements at the station throat.
Services from Liverpool to Leeds and beyond would be diverted from the Cheshire Lines route via Warrington Central and Manchester Piccadilly to the electrified line via Newton-le-Willows and Manchester Victoria.”**
And as work progresses at Victoria Station with a new roof, Andy Roberston headed off to wander the small streets behind Piccadilly Railway Station.
It is an area which like so many bits of the city is bringing brought into the 21st century with massive redevelopment.
I was last there in the mid 1970s exploring the old stables by Mayfield Railway Station, the stump at the bottom of Stony Brew where my old colleague Norman played as a child in the 1930s along with that bit of the Canal where his dad had thrown him in so that he could start his first swimming lesson.
It was a place of warehouses, factories, and small terraced housing dominated by the canal and the railway.
And for Norman a place of vivid memories like the spot where a horse and cart crashed into a wall on Store Street as it lost its footing on that steep incline down Jackson Street affectionately known by many as Stony Brew.
So here in the first of a series are pictures by Andy of that area some of which will soon be lost for ever under the sweep of new development and the new build accompanying the Northern Hub.
Pictures; down by Fairfield Street and Mayfield, November 2014, from the collection of Andy Robertson
*Watch: How Piccadilly and Oxford Road stations could look after £1bn redevelopment, Charlotte Cox, MEN, October 8 2014
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/watch-how-piccadilly-oxford-road-7898576
**The Northern Hub, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Hub
“Central to the project will be resolving the rail bottleneck through Manchester city centre to allow more routes, more capacity and quicker journey times across the Northern cities.
Two new through platforms at Piccadilly will allow 14 trains per hour (up from 10 currently) through Manchester city centre allowing more routes and trains.
Manchester Victoria station will be modernised as the east-west rail interchange in Northern England.
Trains from the north east to Manchester Airport will use a new section of railway, the £85 million Ordsall Chord, between Manchester Victoria and Manchester Oxford Road to reach Manchester Piccadilly and continue to the Airport without reversing at Piccadilly and without conflicting movements at the station throat.
And as work progresses at Victoria Station with a new roof, Andy Roberston headed off to wander the small streets behind Piccadilly Railway Station.
I was last there in the mid 1970s exploring the old stables by Mayfield Railway Station, the stump at the bottom of Stony Brew where my old colleague Norman played as a child in the 1930s along with that bit of the Canal where his dad had thrown him in so that he could start his first swimming lesson.
And for Norman a place of vivid memories like the spot where a horse and cart crashed into a wall on Store Street as it lost its footing on that steep incline down Jackson Street affectionately known by many as Stony Brew.
Pictures; down by Fairfield Street and Mayfield, November 2014, from the collection of Andy Robertson
*Watch: How Piccadilly and Oxford Road stations could look after £1bn redevelopment, Charlotte Cox, MEN, October 8 2014
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/watch-how-piccadilly-oxford-road-7898576
**The Northern Hub, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Hub
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