Pomona in October ............. views across the water

Now once a long time ago Pomona was synonymous with fun.

There were a set of pleasure Gardens there and in an age long before the television, the cinema and certainly You Tube this was a place to come.

Later it turned into a busy industrial spot and more recently had become tired, neglected and run down.

Just the place for Andy Robertson to wander into and record the changes.

Now I have long been a fan of Andy’s work which as people know is all about recording bits of Greater Manchester as they go through a transformation.

And it doesn’t matter if the spot is an old warehouse, a long forgotten pub or an industrial landscape.

Andy is there and just like those photographers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, his work will be an important record of what has happened to the twin cities and the surrounding areas.

So here are two looking across the water.

Location; Pomona

Pictures; Pomona, 2016  from the series Pomona from the collection of Andy Robertson

Down at Pomona

Now I have a soft spot for Pomona, and mainly because of the stories of when it was an amusement garden in the mid 19th century.

And so I was pleased when Any Robertson wandered down there yesterday with his camera and recorded what was going on.

I especially like this picture which pretty much sums up what is happening to the area.

And like so many of his projects I know Andy will keep going back recording the changes.

So as they say watch this spot.

Location; Pomona

Picture; from the series Pomona in 2016 from the collection of Any Robertson

Out by Pomona Gardens with Andy Roberston

© Andy Robertson 

Now I am at one of those neglected and almost forgotten places with two more of Andy Robertson’s pictures.

In the course of the last year Andy has almost adopted the blog for some of his photographs of how Manchester and the surrounding area are changing.

It is an important project as so often we just take for granted when the for sale signs go up on an old building we know well and within months they have vanished and replaced by a bright something which could be an office, an apartment block or even a school.

Worse still the building lingers on slowly deteriorating a sad testament to neglect and vandalism.

So here we are on one of those main routes into the city, where once people flocked to Pomona Gardens which was one of the big amusement parks on the edge of the city and which was the last point where anything green dominated. 

© Andy Robertson 

“Pomona Gardens was one of those boisterous gardens of fun. It boasted a similar mix of attractions to Belle Vue, including ‘the magic bridge, Gymnasium, flying swings, bowling green, rifle shooting, romantic walks and a promenade for both adults and juveniles as well as boat trips on the Irwell’. 

In the summer of 1850 it pulled out the stops with its ‘Splendid representation of the ERUPTION OF MOUNT VESUVIUS, as it occurred in 1849, the most terrific on record’. 

Here was the ‘magnificent Bay of Naples, painted and erected by the celebrated artist Mr A.F. Tait, and extends the whole length of the lake covering upwards of 20,000 yards of canvas and is one of the Largest ever Erected in England’"*

Now with the passage of time much of that industry has gone and the open brown sites and blocks of modern city dwellings have replaced the pleasure gardens, warehouses and factories.

So keep snapping Andy recording what we have lost and what has replaced the old familiar places.

So there behind the arch is that iconic building, once a pub, and now home to Insitu where you can by genuine period pieces taken from clearance areas and lovingly placed in homes where the were ripped out in the 1960s and 70s.

Pictures; from the courtesy of Andy Robertson, 2014

*from Chorlton-cum-Hardy A Community Transformed http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/A%20new%20book%20for%20Chorlton