How easy it is to forget what a place used to be like.
I am a fan of the new St Peter’s Square, partly because I like trams, but more because its transformation has created a large open space, which offers up good views of the Ref, and the Town Hall Extension, but is also just a pleasant place to sit.
So often town squares in Britain are wide windswept stretches of nothing, where litter gathers and pretty soon the weeds sprout up through the paving stones.
Not so St Peter’s Square, which remains a pleasant place.
And while there will be the detractors who preferred it when the Cenotaph stood opposite Central Ref, I remember it as a drab and uninviting spot, not enhanced by Elizabeth House which stood behind the small gardens.
Of course my memories only go back to 1969, but there will be no one who now remembers when the church stood on the old Cenotaph site, or the old tired looking buildings which Elizabeth House replaced.
Location; Manchester
Pictures, at the Metro stop, St Peter’s Square, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and St Peter’s Square, circa 1937, courtesy of David Harrop
So often town squares in Britain are wide windswept stretches of nothing, where litter gathers and pretty soon the weeds sprout up through the paving stones.
Not so St Peter’s Square, which remains a pleasant place.
Of course my memories only go back to 1969, but there will be no one who now remembers when the church stood on the old Cenotaph site, or the old tired looking buildings which Elizabeth House replaced.
Location; Manchester
Pictures, at the Metro stop, St Peter’s Square, 2017, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and St Peter’s Square, circa 1937, courtesy of David Harrop
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