Tales from the Ordsall Chord ...... part 5 ..... Middlewood Locks

So yesterday I said there would be no more from the series on the Ordsall Chord, and then Andy came along with some more pictures and I just had to include them.

Now this is partly because over the years Andy has taken some stunning photographs of the Middlewood Locks, and because by his own admission “we concentrated on the Manchester side but when the train stopped for quite a while we leapt across our seats and took these from the Salford side. 

Didn't send them before because couldn't work out their location, anyway it is the Middlewood Locks development”*.

And that is all I am going to say.

Location; from the Ordsall Chord








Pictures; The Ordsall Chord, 2017, from the collection of Andy Robertson

*The Middlewood Locks, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Middlewood%20Locks

Tales from the Ordsall Chord ...... part 4 ..... looking out from the right side of the tracks

This will be the last for a while of Andy's pictures of a train journey along the Ordsall Chord, but I am going to save the rest of the photographs  for later.

What I like about them is that they offer up new views across the Twin Cities.

I know that along the way we lost a bit of our heritage down near the old Liverpool Road Railway Station and for that I ma sad.

But in the building of the bits that we have now lost, I doubt that the 19th century businessmen, speculators, engineers and navvies who brought the Liverpool and Manchester Railway across the Irwell gave much thought to the green fields, meadows and pleasing scenes which vanished.

Not perhaps a serious defence of what was demolished but a little unoriginal thought on progress.

And as Andy's pictures testify that progress is everywhere.

From the new blocks of flats that rise from the old empty Salford plots which have so long been tatty car parks to the new leisure complexes, like the Home and the YMCA.

They straddle both side of the Salford and Manchester divide.



Location; The Ordsall Chord




Pictures; the Ordsall Chord, 2017, from the collections of Andy Robertson

Tales from the Ordsall Chord ...... part 3 ..... a start and a view

Now Andy won't be the first to have "done the Ordsall Chord" last week but he took the pictures, and beat me to it.

Starting out

So as a thank you to Andy and as a celebration of the new railway link from Manchester Piccadilly Railway Station to Victoria Railway Station vi Salford here are two more with lots to follow.

What I like about the new series is that some will offer up views of Salford and Manchester most of us have never see.

All were captured as the train whizzed along the line.

And some are of bits of Salford's buildings that I know a few are not best pleased with ,but I have a soft spot for, like the elastaplast car park

Whizzing along

What better reason to travel the line.

Location; The Ordsall Chord







Pictures; the Ordsall Chord, 2017, from the collections of Andy Robertson

Tales from the Ordsall Chord ...... part 2 ..... taking the train

Now I was already to travel the Ordsall Chord, that new short line from Piccadilly Railway Station to Victoria Railway Station, but I was defeated by poor planning.

From the tram before the service began

But not so Andy Robertson who made the trip yesterday and sent over some wonderful pictures taken on the move on the journey.

And given that Andy did it first here is the start of the new series which I was going to call "A Day on the Ordsall Chord", but decided instead to stick with Tales from the Ordsall Chord.

They are in no particular order but are a fabulous record of the new railway line and I may add give views of the Twin Cities most of us have never seen.

The first of Andy's pictures

Location; The Ordsall Chord








Pictures; the Ordsall Chord, 2017, from the collections of Andrew Simpson and Andy Robertson

Tales from the Ordsall Chord ...... part 1 ..... always plan the adventure

Now l have never been one to plan an adventure other than to pack a bottle of pop and assorted sandwiches.

And that was my undoing when l decided to take a trip on the Ordsall Chord which is of course the much hyped rail link between Piccadilly Railway Station and Victoria.

It should have been a breeze beginning with the tram from Chorlton to the railway station, which as everyone knows entailed changing at St Peter’s Square and then on the short trip across town to Victoria station, with an option on a return journey.

All seemed well, and just outside the metro stop at Castlefield Deansgate I got a fine picture of the new bridge away in the distance.

At which point I pondered on whether to alight at Castlefield and wander over to the railway station at Knott Mill, confident that this would be on the route between the two railways stations.

Alas the adventure was not to happen, because the service won’t start till later in December.

A lesson l think in forward planning.

But it did allow me a bit more time to admire the wonderful glass and iron roof at Piccadilly, so a trip not completely wasted.

And no sooner after the story went live Paul Sherlock commented that, "new timetables come into effect next weekend, so hopefully we'll see if anything is going across the link then. My understanding of the advanced hype is that it should be operative on 10th December. Meanwhile my carton of orange juice remains in the cupboard". 

And that also seems a plan.

Location; Manchester

Picture; the Ordsall Chord bridge, and Piccadilly Railway Station, 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson