Going Round The Back

For reasons far too dull to go into here, I nipped over to Liverpool today.  Heading for the lift at James Street I noticed there was only one in use; not ideal, but not unusual.  The lifts at James Street are large and aging and get a hell of a hammering - it's rare to see all four functioning.  Going back to the Wirral, I passed through the ticket barriers, and was waiting for the lift when a man appeared behind me and the small group waiting.  "Do you want to come this way instead?"

We were lead across the ticket hall and into the goods lift, a lift I had never before noticed even existed.  It was a little grimier than the usual ones, not quite so well kept, but larger, and comfortably took the dozen or so passengers and suitcases and pushchairs that squeezed in with it.  The Merseyrail man pulled the cage doors closed, pushed the button, and we descended.

Then, much like a theme park, we got the chat.  It seems the Merseyrail man had a spiel, a little monologue he'd prepped, and for the entire descent into the bowels of the earth he talked merrily.  They'd opened up this lift because three were out of action to accommodate the passengers, it's all perfectly safe, couple of little gags for the kids, a whole one man show.  Bless him, he loved his moment in the sun.  And he fell the right side of charming too - not one of those excruciating speeches that make you die inside.  I did video it, but then it occurred to me that it's kind of rude to post someone on the internet without their knowledge (plus there were a load of kids in the video and parents don't like that) so you'll have to take my word for it.

We got down to the concourse below, welcomed by another member of staff, and directed off to our platforms ("Wirral to the right of me, Liverpool to the left").  I tottered off to my platform, pleased to see a side to a station I'd never seen before.

Same Old Brand New You

There are two entrances to Merseyrail's James Street station.  One's got ticket machines, lifts, a refreshment kiosk and enough yellow and grey to make the Colour Tsars go all funny inside.  The other one, on Water Street, hasn't been updated for decades.  It's accessed via a steep, gloomy tunnel, there's a 1970s ticket counter wedged into a 1930s ticket hall, and it's chipped and dirty.  The booking office is only open during peak hours, and when I tried buying a ticket there a couple of years ago, the lady behind the counter had to write it out on a bit of paper.

Which is why Merseyrail have put in a planning application to refurbish the lot.  As part of the Grade II* listed India Buildings, special permissions have to be gained to make any kind of alterations.  Merseyrail could have done a cover-up.  Times are tough; I'm sure they could have made a valid case for covering up all the surfaces with white boards, like at platform level.

Instead, they've applied to restore and enhance the whole area, and I cannot be more happy.

Working with Michael Cunningham Architects - the people responsible for the superb restoration of Manchester Oxford Road - Merseyrail have applied to bring the Water Street ticket hall back to its 1930s finery.  The mosaic tiles will be cleaned and regrouted; where they are missing, reproductions will be created.  The unsympathetic flourescent lighting will be replaced with "heritage-style" modern fixtures.  The Loop line era ticket desk, all blue tiles and stainless steel, is to be torn out and a more in keeping green wood and glass structure will be inserted in the gap.

The 21st century won't be completely abandoned.  There will still be an electronic departures board, but this will be moved to the side in a more subtle location.  The huge emergency/information point will also be replaced with a smaller, more discreet version.  The wiring will also all be tucked away neatly.

Furthermore, in news that is bound to make the Colour Tsars sob into their banana milkshakes, the yellow will be removed from all the heritage areas.  The posters will be surrounded by grey frames, so not a total victory, but the emphasis will be on restoring the green and cream colouring of the original building.

Meanwhile, there's that subway to the platforms.  This isn't actually listed, so in theory, Michael Cunningham and Merseyrail could do anything with it.  It certainly needs some work.  Anyone who's used it knows that it's at a perversely steep angle, with a slippery stone floor and water running into it.  It's not a pleasant feature.

The water, sadly, isn't going anywhere; it's just one of the disadvantages of being 200 yards from the river.  To try and minimise its effect on the passageway the architects have proposed a subtle drainage system, just below the curve of the roof, to catch the worst of the ingress.  Meanwhile, the stone floor - which is original to James Street's opening in 1886 - will receive an anti-slip surface to stop people from skidding all the way to the bottom on rainy days.

As for getting rid of that gloomy, dank feel, they've proposed something special.  The strip lights will be replaced with coloured LEDs.

As you pass up or down the passageway you'll move through different sections of coloured light, breaking up the relentless slog and making the journey far more interesting.  That in itself would be a vast improvement on what's already there, but the nods to James Street's historic position as one of the earliest underground stations in the world will be further emphasised.  The corridor is going to be lined with reproduction Mersey Railway posters, with feature lighting to draw the eye, and brass plaques will be inlaid into the floor showing the station's position at different points in the city's history.  There will even be a new, bespoke wooden handrail along the length (and no, it won't be yellow).

The final enhancement will be on the outside of the building.  The current entrance is via two small doorways in the corner of the India Buildings, and it's not exactly notable.  The deference to the building means it's difficult to spot; in fact, when I collected the entrance back in 2008, you could barely see the station name.

Those fire doors will be replaced with more prestigious ones, in the same green and cream colouring as the interior of the booking hall.  Two new signs will also be erected.  The first is yet another nod to the station's heritage; there used to be an internally illuminated box on the corner of the building, with "MERSEY" (as in Mersey Railway) written on it.  This will be replicated, though obviously it'll say "MERSEYRAIL" instead.  Meanwhile, over the doors, there will be aluminium letters spelling out the station name, back-lit with a "halo" effect.  Basically, you won't be able to miss it.

In short it's the most exciting railway project in Liverpool since Central was rebuilt.  There's an opportunity here to create something which isn't just an improved passenger experience, but is also a tourist attraction in its own right.  Think of how many people visit the Philharmonic Pub on Hope Street just to look at the gents!  Restoring this beautiful ticket hall will make a new sparkling gem in the centre of the commercial district; hopefully it'll be combined with longer opening hours, so that visitors can experience it throughout the day.  I am genuinely thrilled by the proposals, and I have to give rapturous applause to both Merseyrail and Michael Cunningham Architects.  Now please hurry up and do it!

All images, apart from the photographs which are my own, are taken from the planning application and are reproduced for illustrative purposes only.  The full application can be viewed here; comments can be registered until the 29th May.

Second Time Around

Back in November I posted a video of James Street being refurbished.  It was blurry, noisy and slightly rubbish.

So here's another one.

The best thing about the whole refurbishment programme is that the original, Victorian tiles have been revealed.  I didn't realise they were still there.  I'd assumed that the 1970s renovations were so "scorched earth" that they'd been ripped out and thrown in the nearest skip.

It also raises a sad and worrying question.  Are they just going to be covered up again?  Are we going to have to wave goodbye to that wonderful 19th century decor again? 

I'm guessing the answer is probably "yes".  It's always cheaper to just stick up a new look over the top rather than carefully restoring what's already there.  The white tunnel linings already seen across the Underground stations will sit quite happily over the top of these walls, leaving them for when there's actual money available to restore them properly.  As you can see from the video, the space where the Mersey Bookstall once stood has been bricked up in a fairly slapdash fashion - they're clearly not bothered how it's going to look.

I really, really wish this wasn't the case.  I wish this platform was being restored to its full glory.  I wish it was being cleaned up, the tiles repaired, modern but in keeping replacements found for those that were dumped in the Seventies.  I wish it was Liverpool's version of Baker Street's Metropolitan Line.

There's still a couple of months for me to be proved wrong.  Sadly I think that when Platform 3 reopens it will be clean, modern, and a little bit charmless.

Passing Through

Have you ever wanted to watch some blurry, slowed-down footage of building work shot through a train window?  NOW'S YOUR CHANCE.

That's James Street's platform 1, currently being transformed into a gleaming white paradise.  As you can see, all the brown plastic seating has gone, along with the yellow formica walls, and there are plenty of workmen milling about.  Meanwhile, if you look at platform 2, there are piles of new cladding waiting to be installed.

On a related note: poor James Street.  Central got a whole website devoted to its works, along with competitions and posters where the station talked to you.  James Street's just got an adjusted network map and that's about it.

Rebirth 2: The Northerning

Liverpool Central finally opened its Northern Line platforms last week.  I thought about visiting last Friday, when I was in the city for Skyfall, but the sheer amazingness of the film left me light headed.  I didn't want to risk over stimulation by going to a refurbished Central as well.

(By the way: GO AND SEE SKYFALL.  Thank you.)

Instead I waited until yesterday, because I was out in the city with my friend Jennie and her adorable children Adam and Joy.  We had a day of eating, art and shopping, and then headed back to Central so she could get her Northern Line train home.

There was an immediate problem - a queue for the lift.  I've never used the platform lifts at Central, so I hadn't realised what a tiny, confined space it sat in.  I also didn't realise just how popular it was.  The queue of parents with buggies and elderly women stretched right round the corner and into the main concourse.  It was also showing signs of fatigue already: clearly someone with a wayward pram had crashed into the wall and taken off a big chunk of yellow plastic.  I'll be curious to know when that finally gets fixed.

Eventually we managed to wheel Joy's pushchair inside the lift and whizzed down to the platform.  The first impression is how bright it is.  The Northern Line platforms are Victorian in origin, and there was always a cavern-like feel to the space.  The water running down the walls didn't help.  Those corrugated metal coverings are still trackside, but on the island platform itself, everywhere is white.

It means that the centre of the station somehow glows and seems even brighter.

A new circulating space has been carved out under the escalators by moving some of the mechanics; it means that the middle of the platform is much more open and can accommodate more waiting passengers.  With the new seating spaces upstairs, hopefully this will allow for more desperately-needed breathing room - though it seems the passengers haven't modified their waiting patterns yet.  They were still mainly hanging around the long tongue at the foot of the escalators, instead of moving into the new wide open area.

The new escalators now have funky little "no entry" lights at the bottom.  I wouldn't normally care, but it became a welcome moment of colour in amongst all that white.  Another welcome moment of colour is up top, where the entrances to the Wirral and Northern platforms are marked out with coloured arches and LED lighting - a simple but pleasing touch.

Disappointingly, there are still only three escalators.  The steps have been left in the fourth space.  To me, this means that there's still a "right" end of the station and a "wrong" end; one where it's easy to get up and down and another where it's more difficult.  I guess £20 million only buys you so much.

I headed for the Wirral Line escalator.  I'm assuming that there's still work to be done, because there are no signs telling you that's what it is; it's just a way down into the unknown at the moment.  Incidentally, as I took the pic below, the girl on the left was having a blazing row with her boyfriend, and was smacking him quite vigorously round the head; she saw me with my cameraphone and shouted "what's he taking a picture of?".  I made a hasty exit.

A couple of months ago, I was rapturous about the new look Wirral Line platforms.  Now they're complete, I'm going to have to register a couple of complaints.

First of all, they've taken away the line diagram on the tunnel wall.  I understand there are maps and line diagrams elsewhere but still, this was a useful addition to have.  

The second complaint is regarding the signs.  A few years ago the Colour Tsars introduced new yellow and grey signs across the Underground stations.  There were line diagrams, exit signs, and maps of the station.  These new signs have since been rolled out across the network - any time there's a new set of works (like at Hooton for example) the grey and yellow signs are in evidence.

I didn't mind these signs making their presence felt.  What I object to now that Central's been done up is that the rest of them haven't been changed as well.

White background, grey background, grey background, white background.  All above a white band.  It's a mess.  It offends me.  It looks cheap and temporary, and considering the station was closed for literally months that leaves me out of joint.  I want there to be consistency and elegance; I want there to be a definite corporate feel, one way or the other.  Not this ugly mish-mash of both styles.

Am I overreacting?  Being too OCD, too picky?  Absolutely.  It's tiny things like that which niggle.  It's little flaws that make you think that someone doesn't care.  I wanted to endorse the new look station wholeheartedly but I can't.  That stops me from declaring Liverpool Central an entirely flawless success.  That and the escalator thing.  It's close, but not quite there.

It doesn't stop me from looking forward to what they're going to with James Street though.  

Showing Your White Bits

Something exciting happened on Saturday night.  Before you start assuming that I got lucky at Liverpool Pride, I should point out that the BF was present.  Actually, Ian was there as well.  This is just making it sound worse, isn't it?

Start again.

Last Saturday, we passed through the shell of Liverpool Central.  For weeks, it's been the same: concrete walls, a distinct lack of brown.  This time, however, there was something worth seeing.  Workmen had begun to erect the new white wall covering.

I wasn't expecting this, so I didn't have time to video it.  Fortunately, Chris J over at the SkyscraperCity forums was more savvy, and managed to film it:

Thrilling stuff.  It bodes well for Central's proposed re-opening on August 25th (Wirral Line only).

At the same time, publicity is starting to appear about the closure of James Street.  That station's a bit luckier than Central, because its position at the head of the Loop means it has separate in- and out-bound platforms; as a consequence, only one needs to be closed at any time.  A week after Central reopens, on the 3rd September, Platform One will close.

Those anthropomorphic posters are back, along with a new colour scheme.  Central was red and yellow, but James Street is... lilac.  That was unexpected.

This naturally raises the question of what colour the other stations are going to be.  TAUPE FOR LIME STREET!

Travel Advice

This weekend, the Wirral loop under the city centre is going to be closed.  It's to help with the works at Liverpool Central, so presumably they're up to something particularly exciting - is it too much to hope that we'll see some of the new cladding come Monday?

It does mean that James Street becomes the start and finish for the Wirral Line, giving us a rare opportunity to use Platform 2.  This is the old Liverpool bound platform, left over from before the Loop was built, and is probably the most interesting one on the network - not just because it was untouched by the 1970s refurbishments.

For this weekend only you can get up close to Dream Passage, Tim Chalk and Paul Grime's 1992 artwork.  This fascinating piece regularly catches passengers attention from the opposite platform, so you really shouldn't miss the chance to see it properly.  It's a fantastic work that rewards close examination - it's full of quirky details and ideas.  I got a good look back in 2009, when Network Rail were upgrading the Loop's track, and it was great.

Do yourself a favour and get on the train this weekend to have a look.  You'll have to buy a ticket to get down there, but for £2.80 you can have a good nose at a piece of rarely seen artwork, ride a Merseyrail train, and cross under the river and back - not bad value.  You could even treat yourself to a coffee and a sandwich at one of the lovely cafes at Hamilton Square (try Station, next door, or Home in the Ferry Terminal).  Make a day of it.

Closure

Sadface.

It seems appropriate that my final journey started underground.  As you might remember from my forthcoming children's series, Hamilton Square is always feeling sad that it doesn't get to hang out with the cool kids; it's nice that I got to include it on this auspicious occasion.

Yep, this is the story of how I finished off the Merseyrail map.  Accompanying me, for the first time in ages, was the Bf.  He wanted to be there for this important moment, even though he never even reads the blog (he's not a big reader).  Hopefully - hopefully - there would be people at James Street to join in too.

Obviously I was terrified no-one else would turn up.  The Bf tried to console me, saying that at least he would be there, and wasn't he the most important person anyway?  Which shows that you can be with someone for fifteen years and they can still not know you at all.  I can see him any day of the week.

I wasn't disappointed.  Yep, there were people ready to join me on the trip.  Six people, which is actually a nice amount to have - it's enough that you can chat to everyone, not too many, and enough to momentarily boost your ego.  Who were these fellow travellers?

From left: Gareth, Darrell, Lorna (doing her best to hide), Jamie, Robert and another Jamie.  Introductions were done, photo taken, station collected, and so it was into the lift and off to catch a train.  (Incidentally, the Bf was behind the camera, and therefore is in none of these shots; part of my plan to keep him as the Maris Crane of this blog).

Here's what happened.  I was so busy being relieved that people showed up at all, and trying to keep things light and amusing, that I completely forgot where I was going.  I just instinctively wandered out of the lift and straight to the Wirral bound platform, as though I was going home.  Even more weirdly, everyone followed me.   It was only once we were stood on the platform itself that it was gently pointed out to me that we were going the wrong bloody way.  Not the best of starts.

We scurried back up the stairs, ignoring Robert's constant complaints about having a sore knee, and made our way through the labyrinth of corridors to the Loop platform.  Unsurprisingly we were the only people there.  I don't know why more people don't use it to get back to the Wirral - it only adds an extra five minutes or so to your journey, but it means you're much more likely to get a seat home than if you board after the train's been everywhere else in the city centre.

A quick scoot under the city streets and we were out at Moorfields.  This was, of course, the station in the very first Merseytart trip, so coming back gave the whole project a circular feel - a loop, if you will (do you see what I did there?).  We ignored the homeless man crouched at the foot of the escalators, hacking into his glove, and collected the station sign.

It was time to walk to the next station, Lime Street (lower level).  The main line station was collected during that embarrassing time when I was in the Liverpool Echo, in the only example of professional photography on this website; the underground station remained uncollected.  Ignoring Robert's continued whines about his sore knee, we marched across town via the Queen Square bus terminal.  It really was a beautiful day, one of those great Spring moments where there's enough sun for it to be pleasant and not sweaty.  The city centre was throbbing, probably still on a high after the National, and we mixed and merged with happy, laughing Scousers.  Damn, but I love this city.

I'd decided that we'd get our photos outside the St George's Hall entrance to the station, so we'd be in the shadow of one of the finest Liverpool icons.  There were two pensioners already waiting there, though what for, I have no idea; I like to imagine they were Merseytart groupies, just here to catch a glimpse of their idol, and possibly touch the hem of my garment.  Or maybe they were just waiting for a lift home.

And so, to the final section of the Loop, and Liverpool Central.  I didn't quite know what to feel as we stepped off the train.  The weird thing is, it was so familiar, it didn't feel special; I was here only last Thursday, with my friend Jennie, so it wasn't like I was stepping into a new world.  It was the same old,  knackered round the edges Central.  But as we rose up the escalators, it started to dawn on me.  That was it.  That was all of it over and done with.

There was no fanfare, no fireworks, no dancing girls to greet us.  It was just another day at the busy station.  There were crash barriers piled up against one wall, not to hold back the screaming fans, but a relic of the Aintree traffic.  We whisked through the gates and gathered in the shopping centre for the final picture.  (I decided that as that was the entrance to the station proper, that should be the location of the shot).

Cheese!

Nice to see that Jamie was overcome with emotion right there at the end.  Not that Jamie, the other one.

How do you close off such an experience?  How else: with alcohol (except for Darrell, who was still recovering from an extensive drinking session the night before and was sticking to water).  We headed up Bold Street to Bier, the great little alehouse tucked into Newington, and ordered pints of imaginatively titled beers.  The conversation swept round a variety of weird topics (Gus Honeybun!  Upgrading Doctor Who to Blu-Ray!  Fag haggery!  Hooch vs Two Dogs!) but it was friendly, convivial, fun.

As I sat there I realised: five years ago, I didn't know any of these people.  Well, obviously I knew the Bf, and I used to work with Lorna years back, but we'd lost touch.  Everyone else I knew just because of this blog.  We'd become friends - yes, friends - just because I'd looked at a Merseyrail map and thought "I'd like to go to all of those stations one day."  The Internet is a wonderful thing.  People are pretty wonderful too.

(Yes, I've just got an iPhone, so yes, I have Instagram, so yes, I had to take a couple of pretentious looking pics.)

I slipped to the loo and changed into the t-shirt Jamie had brought me (not that one, the other Jamie).  Emblazoned with the 1970s Merseyrail picture, it also had the dates of the whole blog on it: 17 June 2007 through to 15 April 2012.  It was a bit like wearing your own obituary.  He gave me some Merseyrail flip-flops as well.  I didn't put those on, because the toilet floor was suffering from a flood.

So, thank you.  Thank you to everyone who came - Darrell, Lorna, Robert, Jamie, Gareth, Jamie and obviously, the Bf.  Thank you to everyone who's read this blog over the years.  Thank you for commenting, suggesting, criticising, correcting, laughing and enjoying this project.  Thank you to Merseyrail and Merseytravel for tolerating my eccentricities.

I'm not going anywhere yet; there are a few more closing posts to come, and I've got a trip planned for a couple of weeks time.  But this is undeniably the end of an era.

And thank you again.

For What We Have Lost

After yesterday's post about the new MtoGo, I had a bit of a scour through my archives, and I actually found some photos of some of the old Mersey Bookstalls.  Think of this as the Merseyrail equivalent of those "In Memoriam" videos at the Oscars, only without the embarrassing bits where everyone applauds the famous people and ignores the studio execs.

This was the Lime Street stall.  There was a man on my commute who used to buy a cup of coffee from them every morning.  It came in a polystyrene cup, and I can't help thinking that it all tasted of styrofoam by the time he got up the escalators.

Here's the Moorfields Kiosk, and embarrassingly, it's not a Mersey Bookstall at all.  This area has now been replaced by a false wall and a shuttered area; before the MtoGo opened, they were selling tickets from there.  I wonder if there's a second ticket sales area for busy periods?  It can be annoying when you're queuing for a train ticket and the man in front is only buying a Bounty.

The only platform kiosk was at James Street.  I wouldn't be surprised if this is demolished during the station closure later this year, as it takes up valuable space for people to wait in.  I have never seen this one open, which is a shame, as in my imagination it's a real old-fashioned book store inside; very much like the early days of WH Smith.  Sadly the only periodicals Mersey Bookstalls ever seemed to sell were papers or pornography.

Bonus picture:

What sort of hold does Shelly have over Merseyrail?  James Street was closed for extensive refurbishment, but for some reason, they didn't build an MtoGo here.  Instead, Shelly's News and Food have continued to keep passengers in Pepsi Max.  Is she Bart Schmeink's secret daughter?  Does she know about Maarten Spaargaren's first wife in the attic?  Are there corpses buried under the ticket hall that someone at Rail House didn't want uncovering?  The public must be told.

Not pictured are the stands at Liverpool Central and Hamilton Square.  I didn't take pictures of them because that was back in the days when I would be embarrassed about waving my snapper around in a train station.  I'm over that now.

Closing Time

Today's Echo has the details of closure for next year's station upgrades.  The good news is, the stations are being upgraded at all.  The bad news is that the promised station closures aren't going to be restricted to Liverpool Central, as had previously been indicated.  That £40 million is going to be spread right round the Loop, and so is the misery.

I've done a few little diagrams to show how the situation's going to develop over the next few months.

This is the situation right now: a lovely SQUARE loop, interchange stations, trains everywhere.  From the 23rd April next year, it'll change to this:

Liverpool Central will effectively be wiped off the map.  Both the Northern and Wirral line platforms will be closed for refurbishment.  Replacement bus services will run instead, but to be frank, you'd be better off walking.  When the Loop was closed, back when I was commuting from Birkenhead Park to Crewe, I found it quicker to just walk across town than to wait for the James Street-Lime Street bus.  Northern Line passengers can go onto Moorfields and change to the Wirral Line, if they really need to, to end up round by Central.

The Wirral Line platforms at Central will then reopen from the 24th August, but what's that at James Street?  I'm afraid that asterisk means that platform 1 at James Street will be closed from the 2nd August onwards.  Fortunately, that's not too stressful.  It'll still be possible to alight at Moorfields or, if you're really lazy, you can stay on the train all the way round the Loop and get off at platform 3, before the train heads back under the Mersey.  Of course, if you do that, I'll judge you a little bit.

Liverpool Central will then be fully reopened on October 21st, all being well, but the works on platform 1 at James Street will continue until January 6th, 2013.  Work then immediately shifts to platform 3, so people getting on a Wirral-bound train at Central won't have much chance of getting a seat.

The James Street work is due to continue until April 23rd 2013, but on April 21st Lime Street will close for business, until August 21st.  The map will probably show that it's perfectly possible to walk from Lime Street to Central, but I couldn't work out a way to do that without re-jigging the map in a major fashion.  It'll probably be similar to when the Grand National is on and signs appear in the streets to guide tourists to Central for the Aintree trains.

Sixteen months later, and three of the city's underground stations will have been refurbished.  Moorfields and Hamilton Square will also be getting done, but the timescales haven't been specified: it's somewhere "between 2014 and 2019".

What's interesting about this to me is that they're going to close any of the other stations at all.  I understood that Central would need a lot of work, but I didn't realise that the other stations would be getting this level of attention.  I'm actually a bit more excited now, thinking about the level of work that can be achieved in those kind of shutdowns.  Put it a different way: I am REALLY hoping that the brown plastic seats will be gone when I turn up at the new look stations.

Incidentally, my earlier post about Central has thrown up a couple of issues of its own.  As Marke pointed out, the time for expanding the station is rapidly shrinking, while a shopping centre is built over the top; any reconstruction gets 1000x times more expensive the minute you can't dig down from the surface.  The Echo article also alleges that platform-edge doors (PEDs) will be implemented at Central to contain the crowds.  I'm taking that with a pinch of salt.  When the Jubilee Line extension was built PEDs were put on all the new stations, but not on the old ones, because of difficulties with signalling equipment and the software involved.  Even now, the likes of Green Park are open at platform level.  I think this is one of those cases where things are talked about but will never actually happen.

"Anonymous" (why so shy?  We're all friends here) also said that my Kirkby-Hunts Cross plans will never happen because of the flat crossing of the Liverpool-Manchester line.  Running two such intensive services against one another would cause all sorts of hassle.  This doesn't surprise me, as I basically came up with my plan by pointing at the map and working out what I'd like to happen, rather than being practical, but I have since read rumours that Network Rail has a similar idea.  They're considering putting in a turnback facility somewhere beyond Liverpool South Parkway, so trains can reverse without hitting the junction in the first place.  Good for the Northern Line; bad for Hunts Cross, it seems.

I'm less keen on "Anonymous"'s suggestion that staff are employed to force people along the platforms.  We're British; we don't respond well to that kind of forcible behaviour.  That's all a bit Japanese, and we know where that will end, with disgustingly efficient bullet trains.  Members of staff should be kept behind glass screens where they belong, not manhandling the public.  Unless it's that fit bloke who used to work at Birkenhead Park, in which case he can manhan[remainder of this paragraph cut for reasons of taste].

Painting By Numbers

It's a well documented fact that I love Merseytravel's Art on the Network programme. Just click the "art" tag on the right; you'll find a series of love letters to the various bits of art that have sprung up all over the system. To me this is a really good way to enrich the local area - the station environments are enhanced and artists are funded and commissioned by a big company. Win-win.

So far, there have been sculptures, paintings and word poems, and they've all rang my bell, so to speak. Stephen Hitchin's Time and Place at Birkenhead Park makes me smile every time I see it.

The newest series from Merseytravel is entitled "Animate the Underground" and is a series of five paintings - one for each of the underground stations - by the artist Grant Searl. The first, One Life One Love One Liverpool, went up in James Street last November, but I only got a chance to have a proper look at it today.

Now obviously, art is subjective, and one man's masterpiece is another man's toilet paper. But my immediate reaction is - urgh. I really, really don't like it.

Full disclosure - I hate football, so the topic of one city united by a love of the Reds and the Blues is not my cup of tea anyway. It's hard for me to engage with the subject. But leaving that aside, I can't help feeling that the work is just not very good. It looks like a greeting card, with the sickly green airbrushing and the hearts. It doesn't inspire or delight me in any way. It just sits there.

It's made worse by its positioning. Merseytravel have sited it on the disused platform 2 at James Street - alongside Chalk & Grime's Dream Passage. Now THAT is a great, beautiful piece of artwork, which is still as interesting and as unusual today as it was when it was installed twenty years ago. Beside that piece of intriguing art, One Life One Love One Liverpool looks trite and unimaginative. It should have been sited somewhere else - perhaps by the elevators, or in the ticket hall, or basically anywhere else. It just doesn't work on that platform. I might like it more if it were in isolation rather than detracting from Dream Passage.

Grant Searl has four more pieces to come; one has already been installed at Lime Street Underground. These might be more to my taste, as the other stations don't have artwork and could do with brightening up a bit. I should note that the Lime Street one is based around John Lennon though, which makes my heart sink some more. It's another unimaginative commission.

The results of the Art on the Network competition still haven't been announced, so there's still hope there. I still think Merseytravel's public arts policy is a wonderful thing. I guess they just can't please me all the time.

Orpheus in the Underworld

The loop is closed again: the circle is complete. Network Rail have finished their maintenance work, and have thanked us for our patience with a poster of that fit bloke in the Henleys t-shirt from the Railpass ad. Which is the gift that keeps on giving, if you ask me. I can't say I've noticed an enormous amount of difference in my ride quality, but I'm writing this while off work sick, so it may be I just haven't been round the loop enough. Anyway, the gist is: we're back to normal.

What it does mean is that Platform 2 at James Street returns to its ghostly state. Up until the 1970s, this was the platform that trains from the Wirral called at. However, the construction of the loop line meant that a new running tunnel had to be constructed to send the trains Moorfields' way, and so Platform 2 was rendered redundant. It wasn't refurbished in the brown plastic style of Hamilton Square and the other underground stations, and was instead left to rot in its original 19th century state. It receives only the bare minimum of maintenance to keep it up to code for emergencies and closures.

The opportunity to finally use Platform 2 was the high point of the loop closure, as far as I was concerned. It's been attacked by the Colour Tsars, of course, and there are a few incongruous seats and help points, but it's mostly a Victorian underground station, and a little gem. The walls are tiled in that great way that went out of style, then came back in again when people realised how practical it was. It's very similar to the stuff that Yerkes did on the London Underground, and which is now being restored rather than covered up. Of course, the combination of decades of neglect with thirty years of disuse means that the tiles aren't exactly gleaming. The mould and decay is somehow picturesque; it adds to the impression that you're in some deep underground hole. It's all very Neverwhere.

Adding to the otherworld atmosphere is Dream Passage, a piece of artwork by Tim Chalk and Paul Grime on the platform wall. Fragmented images are suspended on the tiles, giving the impression of figures breaking through, or the remnants of another civilisation. It looks great from the opposite (Wirral-bound) platform, but when I got the chance to look up close, I really appreciated the details in it.

The work was commissioned in 1992 to celebrate the hundreth anniversary of the Mersey Railway (though in fact the tunnel was opened in 1886: 1892 was when the tunnel was extended to Liverpool Central). I found a great interview with the artists at the BBC's website; however, for some reason, it's only compatible with mobile phones, so stick that link into your mobile to download it. According to them, their brief was to do anything, so long as it had nothing to do with trains or the Beatles.

It's the city's subconscious, its below surface ideas and thoughts and wants. We've travelled under the ground and under the world to find faces, figures, dreams: winged creatures and babies, and, intermingled with them, elements of the real world. St George's Plateau is there, and so is the Albert Dock, concealed within hieroglyphics and surreal imagery. It's strange and fascinating. The three dimensional work begs to be touched, and over the weeks of the closure I often saw commuters doing that - running their fingers over the grooves and the faces as though trying to understand the weird mix of shapes.

It's another world down there. There's a stark contrast between the gloomy netherworld of the platform and its brightly it 70s cousin across the way, like a fracture runs through time along the tunnel.

Normally this is the point where I complain about the art being rendered inaccessible; a quick whinge about it being hidden away. But actually I prefer it this way. It becomes even more mysterious and curious. It'll remain this strange, unknowable entity across the tracks, something to admire from a distance and to speculate about.