Chasing the Sun

Manchester's railway stations are a curiosity.  There are 93 of them within Transport for Greater Manchester's boundaries, but there's no consistency or rationale behind their services.  If you get on a train at Moorfields in Liverpool, you know that it'll stop at every station on the way; not so in Manchester.  There are skipped stations, semi-fasts, fasts, and, in the case of Clifton, stations that barely get any trains at all.

Clifton gets two trains.  Not two trains an hour; two a day.  And at completely opposite times of day, too.  There's one heading into the city centre at 07:06 in the morning.  Then there's one heading out of town at 18:22.  That's the lot.  I can't seem to find the reason for such a terrible service; it seems to boil down to the railway companies just not being that bothered.  Last year 152 people used the station, in that classic chicken-egg question of "are there hardly any passengers because there are no trains, or are there no trains because there are hardly any passengers?"  I was pleased to have bumped up the numbers by one - I'd deliberately bought a single to Clifton just to make sure it was registered.

I'm pretty sure the man who got off the train with me regards it as his own private empire; he certainly gave me some searching looks as he passed me.  Of course, at the time, I was doing this:

That's the other odd part about TfGM and their railway stations.  Right there is a brand new, shiny sign with the current logo on it.  I've been all over the city and most of them are still bumbling along with old signs - some with the old name for the local transport authority, GMPTE, and its red and white logo; some with the logo before that, in orange and white; even a couple with the short lived Network Northwest branding from the late Eighties.  Clifton though, silly, barely used, Clifton?  Send some men out there to give it a brand new look.  That's a great use of our money.

I turned towards the city at a fast pace.  I had to rush.  It might technically be spring, there may be daffodils bursting out and lighter evenings, but the sun is still setting before seven o'clock.  As I'd ridden the train out of Victoria I'd seen Manchester's skyscrapers outlined with the golden gleam of a dying evening.  If I was going to get to Swinton station, and get a photo outside without using the flash and washing my face out completely, I was going to need to motor.

I headed up a hill lined with big between the war houses, run down and messy.  Closer to the city, these would be worth a fortune, but the other side of the railway line was a collection of factories and workshops, and the M60 hummed in the distance.  There was a vague undersmell of sewage.  The road was rough and badly tarmacced.  A stray dog stared at me from the opposite side of the road, briefly breaking my heart before running on (stray dogs are my Kryptonite, a swift short cut through my cold brittle exterior to my soul).  At a turn I caught a glimpse of the city in the distance.  The tall apartment blocks shining, tastefully lit with glowing LEDs, the Beetham Tower's clunky profile topped by blinking aircraft alert lights.  It seemed so close and, at the same time, impossibly distant.

The scraggy grasses and bare trees accompanying my walk were all part of LIVIA, the Lower Irwell Valley Improvement Area.  I'm pretty sure I'm the first person who isn't a civil servant to use that acronym.  Perhaps, one day, this mess of former industrial properties, sewage works, disused canals and colliery workings will be a happy countryside stroll on which to frolic and picnic.  Right now, it's a lot of concrete that's become overgrown.

The odd homes were now, abruptly, replaced by an estate.  Set way back from the road, corporation houses in red brick.  A convenience store glowed brightly against a darkening sky.

I was going too fast to pay attention, too worried about reaching Swinton in the pitch black.  I cursed the BF.  I'd had a great, gossipy lunch with my friend Mike in Liverpool, and had emerged lazy and relaxed.  I didn't fancy heading over Chat Moss to Manchester any more.  As I mulled over whether to head home, the BF phoned, and encouraged me to go out.  "It's a great day for walking!" he said, and pushed me over the edge.  I'd ended up in the city centre, grumpily drinking chai lattes in a variety of chain coffee houses, bored, waiting for that single train to Clifton.  And now I was here, I couldn't really enjoy it.

I mean, I know it's the outer edge of Salford, not the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, but there were still some pleasing buildings - that row of shops above, for example, with arched entrances to an arcade and flats above.  It came complete with the requisite number of bored teenagers on bikes, loitering at the side of Skittle'z off licence.  In the bus shelter, I was happy to see hand-written signs advertised an Easter Eggstravaganza on the green that Saturday, hosted by the Resident's Association - raffle!  Tombola!   Make a bonnet!

Further on, the husk of a pub made me want to cry.  Once the heart of the estate, now it was - whisper it - a nursery.  Turn it into a block of flats, a Tesco, hell, burn it down, but not a creche.  The devilish boozer was now a home for the Gruffalo.

This sort of artwork is common right across the North.  I've seen it all over.  Bits of industrial machinery piled up on a patch of green.  It's saying, "we may not make anything any more, and you're all unemployed as a result, but doesn't it look pretty".  There was an explanatory board next to it which seemed to spend more of its time talking about the life of the Mayor than the actual history.

I was in the centre of Pendlebury now, a line of shops and pubs strung along the A666.  "Cobi's World Foods" advertised "fruits and vegs".  I imagined poor Cobi trying to get to grips with his sign - but more than one vegetable is vegetables; why is the shortened form just veg?  That makes no sense! - only for the locals to shrug and say, yup, making no sense is what the English Language is all about.  There was a karate school and a beauty salon called Rehab, then a working men's club in the shadow of a huge mill.

At one point, I should imagine the club and the mill were intertwined, the shifts pouring out the gates and into the bar, but now it was the Lowry Mill and filled with companies that seem to have been made up as a tax dodge.  Their website boasts that the newest resident is a "software service revenue specialist", which is just a load of unconnected words strung together so far as I can tell.  I very much doubt it has the kind of employees who'd frequent a working men's club, put it that way.

The sun was almost dead now, the sky the colour of a woodland pool.  LED street lamps flickered into life as I approached, always a slightly thrilling experience, as though I suddenly had power over them.  A trio of teenagers, two girls and a boy, wandered past, talking about nothing and doing lots of it.  A Salvation Army church, a patch of empty land, an off licence called H2O Liquor which was clearly owned by someone who didn't pay too much attention in chemistry.  I crossed the road with a mum and her toddler, the little girl ridiculously excited to push the button, to take a picture of Swinton's tiny square station building.

I'd managed to get there just in time, just before the last of the sunlight was washed away.  Against the cobalt backdrop that brightly lit ticket hall looked wonderfully inviting.  I crossed back, and was disappointed to find that while it was nicely preserved inside, there was no staff, no waiting room, just a hatch with a metal shutter over it.  And unlike Clifton's newly installed TfGM totem, Swinton's sign is just a strip above the door with GMPTE on it.  (Last year, Swinton got 126,000 passengers.  Just to compare and contrast with Clifton's 152.)

There was a much nastier surprise on the platform: boys.  Loitering, bored, teenage boys.  At what age do half a dozen pimply youths stop being wallpaper and become a source of terror?  Is it the minute you stop using Clearasil yourself?  I hovered by the steps, waiting for them to steal my iPhone or push me on the tracks, or worse, take the mickey out of my clothes and hair.  Finally one sidled up to me, drawling in his newly-broken Mancunian voice, "hey mate, d'you smoke?"

"No," I said, resisting the urge to throw all my money at him and run.  He shrugged and wandered back, walking like he had a bowling ball lodged in his underwear, and told them my reply.  The boys all laughed, and I waited for the inevitable mugging-slash-murder-slash-ruthless dissection of my physical flaws.

It didn't happen.  Of course it didn't happen.  Because they were just boys, looking for somewhere to hang out where their parents weren't, and finding a place where there was a seat and shelter and no adults.  They had no malicious intent at all.  The only thing that happened was a rugby player arrived to wait for the Wigan train, and to be honest, he was in greater danger of violation from me, because he was wearing shorts and was fit as hell.

The lights of the train suddenly penetrated the ink, and I clambered aboard a warm, glowing train.  Night was here.  Time to go home.

Best Days

A-level results day inevitably prompts mixed feelings in me.  Feelings of nostalgia and regret.  It's eighteen years since I flunked my A-levels, denying me my first choice university (Keele) and sending me off to Edge Hill in Ormskirk instead.  At the time I was distraught and unhappy.  Now I see it as a blessing.  I've been to Keele, and it's a massive sucky hole of misery in the middle of nowhere (highest suicide rate among all UK universities, I believe).  Edge Hill was small enough for you to get to know people, to have fun and not be lost, and it had that wonderful Merseyrail line to take me off to Liverpool.

I fell in love with Liverpool, I fell in love with the BF, I fell in love with some of the best friends I've ever known, all while I was at Edge Hill.  I didn't make it to my first choice but I had a hell of a good time anyway.  The best time of my life, in fact; everyone should be a student.  It's three years of being an adult, but without any responsibility.  You get to drink and have sex and stay out all night and eat junk food, but you don't have work in the morning or a mortgage or kids or anything to drag you down.  It's half a life away - literally - but it still makes me smile.  My only regret is the one that's beautifully articulated in the song I Wish I Could Go Back to College, from Avenue Q: "I wish that I'd taken more pictures."

For some reason Edge Hill didn't shut up shop after I graduated; in fact it just grew and grew, like a giant academic fungus.  The campus is enormous now; what were sports pitches and the Rose Garden when I was there are now giant teaching centres with acronym names.  The boiler room has been replaced by a huge student complex with coffee shops and breakout areas - we had the bar and a vending machine and the Terrace Cafe, and you'd only go there if you wanted something to eat and you were really desperate.  It's a behemoth.  In a way it's outgrown Ormskirk itself; this tiny market town now has thousands of youths streaming through it for ten months a year.

Last week I went back to Ormskirk to meet Jennie (second from left above).  We took her adorable children Adam and Joy to the park, went on the swings, had a coffee, bitched about life.  The usual stuff 36 year olds do.  Coronation Park was on the way back to our student house in Cottage Lane; it was strange for us to be there without being just a little bit drunk.

At the station there was a real indication that Edge Hill dominates the town.  For many years, Ormskirk's Attractive Local Feature board was this:

Pretty typical for a small country town.  My latest visit revealed that the ALF had changed:

This pleases me for a number of reasons.  Firstly, I'm glad that Merseytravel and Merseyrail are still doing the ALFs; I was worried they'd been phased out.  Plus they kept the old colour scheme.  And of course I'm just happy to see Edge Hill getting some recognition, even if they picked a pretty bland building to represent the university.  I suppose they want to look all "modern" and "thrusting", but that building could be anywhere.  They should have used a picture of my beloved LRC (Learning Resource Centre, now unimaginatively renamed the "Library"), or the Venue, or a drunken student getting his stomach pumped after failing to handle all the alcohol in the "Around the World in Forest Court" booze crawl.  Next time, come to me for advice.

Now I'm off to have a little nostalgia fest: drinking cheap lager while I listen to Space and Gina G and Echobelly and Alisha's Attic and Terrorvision (Whales and dolphins, whales and dolphins, yeah!) and missing the old days.  

Poetry in Motion

It's Liverpool Biennial time again!  Hurray!  For two months you have the opportunity to wander round some buildings, staring at things and trying to understand what they're on about.  You probably won't ever get it, but if you stand there and nod for long enough, other people will think you do, and that's the most important thing isn't it?

I've already been on a couple of expeditions to some of the exhibitions, in the company of Robert and Mike. Some was good (most of the stuff in the Cunard Building), some wasn't (an awful lot of the stuff at Copperas Hill) and some was baffling (FACT's video installations - sorry).

One place I haven't yet been is METAL, out at Edge Hill Station.  This is despite it being in, you know, a train station.  In fact, I haven't managed to get out there since it opened, which is criminal.  I think I'm just saving it up for a special visit, and that special event just hasn't happened yet.  Which is a shame, because it has an interesting programme of events.  I'm sure I'll get there eventually.  Perhaps for Biennial 2030.

I've already missed one of the most interesting moments of their Biennial programme.  The 12:01 Liverpool to Wigan service became a moving sound gallery for two weeks a specially-commissioned piece by the poet John Cooper Clarke was played to the passengers.  The piece was designed to last the duration of the journey from Lime Street to Edge Hill, and concerned our old friend William Huskisson.

Regular readers will know I've got a slight obsession with William Huskisson (HUSKISSON!), the first man to be run over by a train.  He was killed just outside Newton-le-Willows, on a service from Edge Hill, so this feels like an appropriate place for him to be commemorated.  You can hear Cooper Clarke's poem below:



Good hair.

I like the rhythm of the piece, the way it rides over and over in your head.  I wish I'd caught it live on the train - I'd love to have witnessed the passengers' reactions.  Bafflement, enjoyment, or just that blank void that fills the space between your ears when you're commuting?

It's still available to hear at Metal at Edge Hill station, so you still have time to hear it in one of the birthplaces of the railway system.  I really should get out there myself one day.

More HUSKISSON! related nonsense:

HUSKISSON! - the book.
HUSKISSON! - the dock.
HUSKISSON! - the memorial.
HUSKISSON! - the statue.

Terminus

I went to Whitby over the weekend.  It was my friend Mike's birthday, so we joined him and his wife and his gorgeous little girls for an afternoon by the sea.

Obviously I didn't take the train.  If you want to go from North to South in Britain, it's simple.  If you want to go West to East, you may as well strap a rucksack on your back and hike your way over the Pennines.  The Bf and I drove instead, braving the 25% inclines in the North York Moors National Park to get to Whitby in the middle of the afternoon.

The original plan was that we would spend the whole day over there, travelling on the North York Moors Railway from Pickering to Whitby.  However, Jennie and her husband Jim, who were also coming, pointed out that getting there for a 9:30 train would mean leaving home at about 5:30... and we're all lazy.  Though to be honest, I was willing to give it a try, just because I wanted to have a go on the trains.  Common sense (and everyone else's whinging) prevailed in the end though.

I did have a poke round Whitby station while I was there though; old habits die hard.  It's a lovely building, right in the centre of town with the fishing boats within sight.  There was some kind of motorcycle gathering going on, which meant it was surrounded by large men with moustaches in leather.  Quite disconcerting.  I headed up into the classical-inspired cloisters.  It's the side of the building, and yet, at the same time, it's the entrance; the station has two fronts, both of which are well designed.

Inside was disappointing though.  Obviously, the station's seen better days.  There's only one platform still in use, which is bad enough, but in such a grand terminus, it looks even more inadequate.  There's an awful lot of bland chippings filling in the spaces.  I'm pleased they've maintained the glass roof though.

There's also a nice tiled map of the North-East on the wall, which acts as an interesting counterpoint to the Lancashire & Yorkshire map at Manchester Victoria.  It adds to the feeling that the station has been nicely preserved.  I wonder if it would be as pleasant if there wasn't heritage services using it as well as the Northern Rail ones?

Another arcade takes you out to the front of the station, which gives you a low key, grand entrance to the place.  It really is a lovely little station, and is the kind of thing I wish all small towns had: well built, distinguished and elegant.  And the clock works too.

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

I woke up this morning to find a box on my doorstep. Nothing new there: I'm currently being stalked by Russell Tovey, and he frequently leaves me gifts - chocolates, jewellery, pictures of him naked save for a pair of opened toed sandals. I keep saying stop, The Bf will find out, but I just can't quell his ardour. It's a hard life.

However, this box was different. Eight inches square, it was wrapped in plain brown paper, and my name was spelt out using letters cut from the newspaper. I wracked my brains: did I know anyone who had recently been kidnapped? After all, I know some very important people. One of my friends has met Cherie Blair. He could be in a cellar somewhere, right now, chained to a radiator with only a transistor tuned to the World Service for company. Unlikely, because no-one uses transistor radios these days, but you never know.

I gingerly opened the package, and inside was a letter. It had been wrapped around a Sheila Hancock souvenir paperweight: she was wearing her wimple from Sister Act. I took this as a veiled threat, having seen her as a Madam Whiplash judge on Over The Rainbow.

Dear Merseytart

it said.

I read what you wrote about Hooton the other day and I thought I'd put you right on a few things. Don't ask who I am: just trust me when I tell you that I am amazing, and know more than you ever will.

There are no plans to cut back the Ellesmere Port service to a shuttle, as you discussed. Quite the contrary. Merseyrail are planning on increasing the Chester service to four trains from December, yes, but that will be at no cost to the Ellesmere Port service. Through effective management of the fleet, they'll be able to increase frequencies without causing any problems. That'll mean six trains an hour between Hooton and Hamilton Square, and a total of fourteen trains an hour between Hamilton Square and Liverpool. Not bad eh?

"That's pretty good," I said, then realised I was talking to a letter.

Chester's not just one of the busiest routes: it also has "suppressed demand". There will have to be a change to the maintenance routines, but they will manage. There'll be no need to bring in the trains from down south for the new schedules, either, though Merseyrail is still looking at the possibility of bringing them into the fold in the future. Passenger numbers are rising all the time.

"So why improve Hooton? What's the reason?" I gasped.

I'm not sure why I can hear that, but here's the answer to your question. Hooton is being improved because it's a busy junction with a large car park that has been a little neglected. That's it. There's no ulterior motive - just a desire to make the station that little bit better, that little bit nicer, that little bit more accessible.

You're a cynical chap, I know: but remember that sometimes people do things for good reasons.

Yours,
A RELIABLE SOURCE

P.S. This letter will now self-destruct.

With that, the missive burst into flames in my hand. As I ran my burnt fingertips under the cold tap, I couldn't help smiling. Two more trains an hour to Chester is fantastic news - that's doubling the service. It's a plan with no down sides. Increased frequencies between two major cities, metro-level service along the Wirral Line, and Ellesmere Port stays as an integral part of the network. Marvellous. Hurrah for anonymous tip offs!

Putting The Boot In

Where 007 goes, I follow. I have mentioned my status as a slavering James Bond fan boy before in passing. I can't help it. I just love James Bond - the films, the books, everything. To me, there is no better way to spend two hours than watching an arrogant self-centred man seduce beautiful women, drop sarcastic comments, and perform outrageous acts of deplorable murder for his country. Before blowing up an entire building. You get sex, violence and comedy; what more could you possibly want?

Unless you've just emerged from a comatose state, you'll be aware that the new Bond film, Quantum of Solace, hit the cinemas on October 31st. It's become a tradition that my friend Mike and I attend the first showing of a new Bond, going way back to 1997, when we were just students and so we could afford to waste a morning watching Tomorrow Never Dies (not that watching a Bond film is ever a waste of time). Now we're "grown up", it's become more difficult to organise - we have jobs, and responsibilities, and in Mike's case, even a child to enter the equation. But somehow we still manage to book a day off to go and watch various things explode (and here's my potted review, incidentally: AMAZING. Amazing in a different way to Casino Royale, but amazing nonetheless. Go see it. That wasn't a suggestion.)

I took advantage of this day off to book another one specifically for tarting purposes. My last few posts have been sadly devoid of me actually getting out and about (apart from the Chester Rant, and even that was accidental), so I thought it was about time I got out and filled in a hole on the map.

Out on the Northern Line were four stations which remained uncollected, mainly due to Merseyrail's improvement schemes. They've been rebuilding Bootle Oriel Road for well over a year, and so I left it off the list so I could witness it in its completed state.

But before all that, I had to get to Liverpool, and I went over to the city with The Bf first thing to try and get a Wirral Line station. I've avoided the city centre's four stations, by and large, ever since Mr D in one of the old posts suggested that I finish with all four of them in a grand victory loop. The idea really appealed to me, and I came up with an idle concept of a four way pub crawl (not so much a crawl as a mild skip) - alighting at each station, capturing it for posterity, then having a pint of Liverpool's own Cains beer in a nearby bar. Assuming Cains is still going when I finish. Moorfields, I know, was caught right at the start: but I still haven't done the Old Hall Street entrance, and besides, I can go there again just for the hell of it.

On top of this, James Street has had its main ticket hall rebuilt completely, and so I didn't want to go there until it was done. The early start did mean that I had the chance to capture an alternative entrance however: the one to Water Street, which is housed in the basement of the India Buildings. It's only open at peak times, so this seemed like the best way to get it - much to my asthmatic other half's discomfort. To get to the ticket hall, you have to negotiate this tunnel.

Doesn't look like much, does it? Think again. Cunningly hidden inside the tunnel are vast fans, which suck the oxygen out and leave you a pitiless, airless husk, gasping for breath. Ok, I may have lied about the fans, but there's something about this tunnel which makes it a challenge to even the fittest. It's something to do with the way it's angled - deceptively straight, but in reality a relentless uphill slog to get you to street level. The cunning gentle twist in its passage also disguises its length, so you think it's about to end, but no! There's still another 20 yards to go.

Gasping for breath, and with The Bf sucking in a frankly disturbing way on his Ventolin, we emerged into the ticket hall. Because it's just an auxilliary entrance, Merseyrail have pretty much ignored it - and thank God. There's a bit of 70s unpleasantness with the ticket window (which looked unmanned), and the Colour Tsars have been out again with the yellow and grey, but the rest is pure pleasure.

(Apologies for the blurring). Beautiful tiling, lovely ceiling details - just marvellous. I particularly liked the telephone booths: their symmetry, either side of the exit, was of course a definite pleasure for me, but they also summoned up 30s glamour: flappers calling cabs after nights of scandalous indulgence, monocled businessmen making terribly important international calls, journalists with paper stuck in their bowlers calling in a scoop at the last moment. It's a shame it's been allowed to decay. I know no-one uses telephone booths any longer, but it could be scrubbed up a bit, an old two-part phone could be installed for show, and it could be discreetly lit. A little bit of charm to distract the commuters on their way to the offices - or would it be wasted on the head down scurriers who breezed past me and my camera, oblivious to everything?

Eventually we had to get on with things, so it was out onto the street to tart the entrance - though I was surprised to see there's no actual station sign outside. If you squint below, you can just about see the name on the map by my shoulder:

With the Bf off to work (ha!) I was left to my own devices, off to buy a Saveaway for my trip to Bootle. I considered stopping off at Sandhills, en route: it's been open since July. But one look at the mass of building work and scaffolding on the platform changed my mind. It was clearly a long way from completion, so I stayed on the train and carried on, through Bank Hall (where there were men on the platform looking befuddled at the art - what is it?!?!) and then off at Bootle Oriel Road.

It looked like the work was still carrying on here, too. The only people who got off with me were a load of builders in hard hats, who met up on the platform with other builders in hard hats, to discuss whatever builders in hard hats talk about - cement, or something. Bits of the station were still encircled by that plastic mesh fence that is put out temporarily while the tarmac dries, and it felt bitty, somehow. I crossed over to the other side and got the obligitary "I WOZ ERE" shot outside, then took a look at what £4.25 million buys you in stations these days.

The answer? Not a lot.

Let's be frank here: that's a mess. I feel disloyal for saying this, because I've ranted at length about money not being spent on stations, but that's all over the place. It's steps! It's ramps! It's lifts! I understand there's a Disability Discrimination Act to comply with, but this is ramshackle, and unfocused. There's no "wow!", which is a shame. After the mega "wow!" of James Street, this was retail park "will this do?" architecture. Is it asking to much for the station building to at least look permanent? It was a major disappointment, and genuinely dispiriting. It also made me pessimistic about the prospects for a good design at Sandhills.

Crashing on. Next stop is Bootle New Strand, so I hoiked myself onto the main road and headed north. It's years since I'd been to Bootle. Mike - my Bond sharing friend - once worked for the Inland Revenue here. They're housed in a building with the not at all terrifying name of The Triad. If you want to house a Government department, why not choose a building named after an international criminal gang? I'd come out here to have lunch with him in a Yates' at the Triad's foot (we're all class), and so I'd got a look round the infamous Strand shopping centre while I was at it. It was dispiriting to say the least. Grey, unpleasant shops, low end chain stores, covered vacant fronts: I haunted the artificially lit malls for a while before I burst out onto the street in search of a bit of sun and freedom. I believe it's been refurbished since then, expanded, re-energised, but I didn't fancy poking my head in to find out. The shopping centre turns its back on the road outside, presenting an ugly concrete face to the traffic, with the only colour being a grim looking pub squatting in the corner. It almost seems to resent Bootle, but in fairness, Bootle seems to resent it right back.

I don't want to sound down on Bootle. Before I got to the New Strand, I'd passed the new Health & Safety exec building: modern and vibrant and exciting. Opposite the shopping centre, there's a tall block of apartments under construction, and new shops, so it seems that there is money coming into the area. All I can say is that I was able to travel between the two stations in less than fifteen minutes, and I had no desire to linger.

Anyway, a bit of positive about Bootle New Strand: it was another rebuilt station, but for some reason this one seemed far more charming than the other one. Perhaps it was the clock (though it could do with a clean), or perhaps it was the little newsagent by the entrance. An old lady hobbled up to it ahead of me to buy her Daily Post, which I found sweet. I wondered if she'd been doing that for decades, right back to when the station was called Marsh Lane & Strand Road in the 60s, before they built the shopping centre. There was meant to be a bridge, going directly from the station into the shops, but it was never built, and now you have to cross the busy road to get to the centre and the buses.

Another plus about Bootle New Strand was that it gave me the closest thing to an Attractive Local Feature board all day. OK, it's basically an advert, and it's only half the size of a proper one (a semi-ALF? A quasi-ALF?), and let's face it, it's not very pretty, but I'll take what I can get, quite frankly.

The next station was Seaforth & Litherland. All I know about this area is there was once a Sunday night tv drama on BBC1 called Seaforth: it starred Ken Barlow's son and it was the kind of thing that Grannies like, and I remember there being some sort of vague controversy when it was cancelled after one series because it had got loads of viewers but the BBC1 controller just thought it was shit. Perhaps, to commomorate this gone-before-its-time series, Seaforth & Litherland's ALF would be a picture of Linus Roache crying, or perhaps a pile of burnt TV licences. Or perhaps everyone else in the world has forgotten about this show, and Seaforth & Litherland would have its own charms to capture my attention. Who can say?

Not Waving, But Drowning

It's been a while, hasn't it? A couple of months in fact. I can only apologise and say that I have been very, very busy. Basically, I've changed jobs, and so there's been a whole lot of upheaval and all that, and it means I've had to say goodbye to my Railpass. Sob! Like Mr D in the comment section of my last post, I was extremely upset to have to let go of the old girl. In fact, I even did a little calculation to see if there was any way I could justify £85 a month to keep it (I couldn't).

I've gone from working in Chester to working in Crewe, somewhat ironically. The MerseyTart is now esconced in the cradle of railways. And I am getting that thrill from arriving and departing from a major hub.

But it's not the same. I miss my little yellow and grey trains. I still get a little bit of Merseyrail action, from Birkenhead Park to Lime Street every morning, but it's not as much fun.

So I was lucky enough to be able to get a day off for MerseyTart antics. I say a day off - I was on strike. Yes brothers, as a local government minion, I was joining in the national action for pay. Comrades! Rise up and be counted! Well, actually, when I say "joining in" I actually mean "relishing the prospect of a day when I didn't have to go to work". I would have been rubbish in the Winter of Discontent.

The whole network was opened up to me, and I decided that I would get some more City Line stations. After last time's disaster (well, apart from the good food and beer) I would be determined and conscientious about capturing the stations on this route. Instead of my trusty Railpass, I bought a Saveaway, Liverpool's version of the One-Day Travelcard.

The branch I chose was out on the far end of the map, between Whiston and Newton-Le-Willows. This is, ladies and gentlemen, no ordinary railway line; this is the world's first intercity line, the original Liverpool to Manchester route. I was travelling on a route that had been laid out by George Stephenson and opened in 1830. Millions of travellers all over the world can trace their daily commute back to this single piece of railway track.

As is usual on the City Line, I went out to come back, and I alighted at Newton-le-Willows. My first surprise about Newton-le-Willows was that it was even in Merseyside in the first place. I had in my head that it was very, very posh; prime WAG territory. Perhaps it's the "le" that did it for me. Towns with a "le" always sound like they have ideas above their station. What's wrong with "in the Willows", eh? Anyway.

The station was being refurbished when I arrived; half the staircase was blocked with scaffolding, and the workmen had to down tools and step aside to let the alighting passengers through. It looked like a nice 19th century station, but with all the builders covering it, you couldn't really stop and appreciate it. I headed outside in search of a station sign, and I was disappointed to see that the only one on show was a platform sign transplanted to the roadside. Perhaps that's how posh it is round Newton; they refuse to have a Merseyrail box sign outside, lowering the tone. The sign was quite low down on the pavement too, resulting in me having to practially squat by the side of the busy main road to get the whole name in; an undignified start to proceedings, really.

Normally, I'd now proceed at haste to the next station, but instead I went in the opposite direction to seek out a bit of history. It was a terrible day to be out, raining constantly, a mist of fine drizzle that clung to me as I trekked out of town. The large suburban houses gave way to a garden centre, then I was walking under the M6 and I was out in the countryside. I was looking for a memorial to the world's first railway casualty.

The Liverpool & Manchester Railway was opened by the Duke of Wellington, then the Prime Minister, with all the attendant pomp and circumstance. The Duke himself then rode a train, with carriages of flunkeys and MPs in tow, from the Liverpool end in the direction of Manchester. It had been decided that halfway along the line, the Duke's train would stop so that a train coming in the opposite direction could process by.

You or I would think this was a great opportunity to relax in our seats and do our best regal waves as the other train went past. This is why you and I are not politicians. Instead, the MP for Liverpool, William Huskisson, decided to take the opportunity to walk down the train to talk to the Prime Minister (history has not recorded why he wanted to talk to him; I'm guessing toadying came into it somewhere). Unfortunately, Huskisson had completely forgotten that he was in fact walking on a railway line, and so was taken by surprise when a train turned up. So surprised he fell underneath it, and his leg was crushed. One report says that as the train went over him, he called out his own surname, which I think is rather wonderful, and I intend adopting "Huskisson!" as an exclamation of pain and surprise from now on.

Huskisson was rushed to hospital on the train to Eccles, but he couldn't be saved, and he died; sad for him, good for pub quiz question masters. (Incidentally, the Duke of Wellington carried on, despite the loss of one of his MPs; he was promptly pelted with stones in Manchester by citizens still incensed by the Peterloo massacre. You couldn't really call it the most auspicious of launch days). He was buried in a large monument in St James' cemetary in Liverpool (now in the shadow of the Anglican cathedral), but a year later, a memorial was built on the site where his unfortunate accident occurred. And that's where I was headed.

There are no signs to guide you to the Huskisson memorial; you have to know where to look. And even when you get there, it's pretty difficult to see. Notwithstanding that it was a grey, miserable day, it was pretty difficult to get a decent look at it. Large trees and bushes were planted on the embankment directly opposite it, so I couldn't go there, and behind it, there was an iron fence blocking the way. Basically, the only way to get a decent, full on appreciation of Huskisson's memorial would be to stand in the middle of the railway tracks. I believe that's a textbook example of "irony".

Much as I would have loved to sacrifice myself in front of the 10:32 to Manchester Piccadilly as a way of truly memorializing William Huskisson, I thought it was better to settle for a peek from the nearby road bridge. I wondered how many people even noticed the memorial from their train window as they passed, and, if they did spot it, if they knew what it was. Probably best not to know, really; you don't want to be reminded of railway fatalities as your high powered train is burning through the countryside. Sort of like reading "Alive!" on an aeroplane.

Memorial snapped, I returned to Newton-le-Willows, along its pretty high street, in search of Earlestown. I was getting really wet now, so drenched that I had to take my glasses off; the refractions through the water on the lenses made me feel like The Fly, so I considered it safer to just squint through the drizzle instead. The social scale took a definite slide as I walked. Newton's street of hair salons became Earlestown's road of Bargain Booze. It culminated in this glorious wreck of a cinema, opposite the station; somehow, I like it more as a shattered husk. There's something so evocative about it. I'd rather it stayed like that than be turned into an evangelical church or a bingo hall; I like that it's a reminder of the past, and an era that's gone forever. (Of course, I may be in the minority in this).

Earlestown station building was unimpressive from the street. In fact, possibly the most impressive thing about the shot that follows is my hair. The non-stop precipitation had turned me into Gareth Gates.

The platform buildings were much more interesting, which was fortunate, as I had to wait there twenty minutes for the next train. Earlestown holds a significant "first"; this was the first railway junction in the world, formed when the line to Warrington crept up to meet the Liverpool line, and it's now a large triangle with platforms on each side. (For a time it was even shown on the Merseyrail map as three seperate interchange circles). The platform building, meanwhile, is one of the oldest railway buildings still at an open station in the world. It's long been bricked up - leaving us passengers to loiter in the rain for our connection, as there were no waiting facilities on platform 3 - but the station's operators have at least put a brave face on this, decorating the closed building with heritage-type decorations:

The station also featured a good old, traditional drunk; huge of beard, many of carrier bag, sipping from a can of lager. I salute you, gentleman of the road. And rather more scenically, there was our first ALF of the day:

"For Town Centre and Market"? Yawn. Nice to see anyway.

Finally the train arrived, and I was able to leap on board. This isn't an exaggeration. Because of the curve of the railway, the gap between the train and the platform was about a foot; I had to grab hold of the rail and drag myself across. Having risked life and limb, I was able to settle down and dry out a bit before I hit St Helens Junction.

St Helens Junction, incidentally, is a dump. I can usually find a bit of beauty in all railway stations, but this was a dull, uninspired building surrounded by industrial estates. In addition, I almost cracked an ankle slipping on the steps down to the pavement; I was therefore not in the best of moods when I snapped the station shot. I didn't care that you could barely see the sign, I just wanted to get on to somewhere more interesting.

The road to Lea Green, my next stop, was theoretically through countryside. There were fields clearly visible on one side of the road, but the lumbering roar of the juggernauts put paid to that St Mary Mead atmosphere. And then the rain got even heavier, long, hard, driving raindrops that weasled down the back of my neck and slicked my jacket against me. "July" was just a theoretical; outside St Helens, I was in Autumn.

Worse still, there was a hill to climb to Lea Green, and my sense of direction deserted me halfway up it. I remembered from my map that it was a long, straight road from one station to the other, yet I was sure I'd made a right turn. And shouldn't I have encountered the station by now? It wasn't that far. With the rain pissing on me, I pulled out the map and tried to get my bearings, but I couldn't see any of the local roads on the map. Swearing like a member of the aristocracy who's just caught his knackers as he dismounts his horse, I did a volte face, thinking I must have missed a turn. But after a hundred yards, I was filled with doubt again, so the map came back out, and I found where I was. Yep; I'd been going the right way all along, and all my doubt had done was start my road map on the route to papier mache and ensured that I would miss the next train.

Angry with myself, I continued trudging up the hill until the yellow and grey shed that was Lea Green appeared on the horizon. Though the watchword for today's trips was "history", here I was bang up to date; the station dates only from 2000. I arrived at the railway bridge in time to hear the train rev up and leave the platform without me. It was therefore a somewhat grumpy MerseyTart who found himself posing under a nondescript park and ride sign.

Did I mention it was raining?

I slopped down to the platform, my trainers having let half of Lake Titicaca in over the course of the day (two blisters would be my souvenirs from the trip), and into the thankfully covered shelter to wait the half an hour for the next onward train. I felt bushed. I leaned against the plexiglass of the shelter and let out a deep sigh. I love travelling round the network for this blog, but the rain and the wind and the miserable surroundings had all conspired to make me feel frustrated and bitter. It was making me dwell on other things, other times where I'd felt down, other frustrations in my life. Thinking that maybe this wonderful new job isn't quite as wonderful as I'd hoped it would be, and might in fact be just as shitty as the old one, but in Crewe.

If this were a novel, then this is where a chirpy station attendant would appear and raise my spirits with a happy tale, and perhaps an invite into his warm station building for a cup of tea. This is not a novel. No-one else turned up on the platform until about two minutes before the train departed, when suddenly it was swamped.

What cheered me was a combination of three things:


1) The rain stopped. Okay, now I was under cover, so it didn't make any difference (besides, I couldn't actually get any wetter, short of chucking myself in the Mersey) but it was a pleasure none the less;



2) Lea Green has an ALF. I don't know where Sherdley Park is, but I'm glad it is commemorated in this way. Can I point out that the paint hasn't flaked off that duck? The white spots are part of the artist's interpretation. I checked out a couple of other signs to be sure. It's another boring bird, but it's better than Earlestown's market stall by a long chalk.


3) I got to watch a game of human MouseTrap. Being a new station, Lea Green is fully Disability Discrimination Act compliant, and the route up from the platforms (which are in a cutting) to the street is marked by a long series of ramps, rising upwards slowly. A train pulled in as I was photographing that scabby duck, and all the passengers began their steady climb up the ramps; back and forth, back and forth, like they were on a roller coaster building up to a big drop. It actually got funnier and funnier as they rose - it seemed so laborious, and silly. Sadly, I was too busy smirking as people passed one another again to take a picture of their steady ascent (or even better some video), but hopefully you get the idea. I should also point out there was a flight of stairs which no-one seemed to notice.


The half hour wait meant that I was a lot drier now (though not my shoes; they still squelched), and by the time I got off the train at Rainhill, I actually looked like a human being again. And the Attractive Local Feature board provided me with a handy one-two; not just another ALF for the collection, but also a handy reminder of this historic spot.



(Look how wet it is!). Rainhill was the home of the Rainhill trials which, as the sign points out, took place in October 1829. With the railway nearing completion, someone actually had the bright idea of scrounging up some locomotives to run on it, and a competition was organised to find the right engine for the job. Rainhill, with its long straight stretch of level track, was chosen for the job, and the entries lined up to complete the course. The idea was that the locomotives would complete ten trips over the mile long course, and the one that performed the best would win £500 and be the locomotive for the railway.

There were ten entries, but only five actually made it to the course. Four were called the Cycloped, the Perseverance, the Sans Pareil and the Novelty. If I tell you that the fifth one was called Rocket and was designed by George and Robert Stephenson, have you guessed the winner? Though really the names should have been a bit of a giveaway. The thrusting, white hot future of technology could hardly be represented by the Sans Pareil, could it? Rocket was the only one to finish the trial, and so the contract for the engines for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was given to the Stephensons.

I had all this in my head when I got to Rainhill, so I was even more excited to see that there was an exhibition on the trials. A noticeboard on the station informed me that it was housed in the local library, so off I went, keen to get that bit of local colour.

I was hoisted on my own petard. The reason I had been able to gallavant all over Merseyside was because I was a local government worker on strike. And what are librarians? Local government workers. Oh dear. A closed and barred Rainhill library stopped me from furthering my knowledge of Novelty and friends. I will have to make a return visit sometime.

Instead, I trudged back through the village (which is very pretty, incidentally) and I was away. I crossed the railway bridge (interesting fact: this was the first railway bridge in the world to be built at an angle across the tracks. Ok, I'll stop with the factoids now) and walked towards Whiston.

Just one more station to go, but I needed to make another diversion first. Not historical this time; quite the opposite in fact. My good friends Mike and Kirsten have recently had a baby, and as they live in Whiston, I needed no further excuse to pop in and coo over little Ella. Also, I wanted a free cup of tea.

Fortunately Kirsten was more than accomodating, and allowed me to sit and stare at her absolutely adorable child for an hour. Really, she is a lovely baby. Look:

Sweet! Bless her and her little smiley face.

Recharged with Typhoo, I was reluctantly dragged away from the baby and sent on my way to Whiston station. This is another new one, built in 1990, and tucked away inside a council estate. I apologise for the badness of this pic (as opposed to the badness of all the rest, of course); but the train was literally just coming down the tracks as I arrived, so it was a make-do picture, snapped in a hurry before I headed for the train.

So what have we learned from this jaunt? Firstly, we've learnt that just because your feet are covered, doesn't mean they're watertight.

Second, we've learnt that Ella is one of the loveliest babies in Christendom, and that despite my gruff, cynical exterior, I can melt at the sight of a smiling child just like a 94 year old woman.

Third, we've learnt that Merseyrail isn't just a commuter network; it's the ur-network, the one that started it all. The map shows this line going from Liverpool, and a tiny arrowed box indicates that it heads to Manchester, but really that box should say London, Paris, Delhi, Vladivostock, and all points beyond. This is where railways began, where they started to change the planet and the way we behave and act and live. The railways drove the world forward, and this line made Liverpool (and Manchester) right at the front, riding Stephenson's Rocket into the future. And as a passenger in the future, in a world where railways are taken for granted at best and rubbished at worst, it's nice to be able to ride the same rails and pay homage to the people who built it, and to try and stop people from forgetting just how fantastic a train ride can be.

Memory Lane

This is the new look Ormskirk station, as announced by Merseytravel, and frankly I'm in two minds. I am always, always pro-investment in the network; if they announced tomorrow that Bebington station would be replaced by robots with death rays I would be violently pro. But Ormskirk is where I studied, is where I lived for 3 years; Ormskirk is a place I am so affectionate towards, I have deliberately avoided visiting it in my MerseyTart antics because I want to make it a special occasion. My first Wednesday afternoon at Edge Hill College/University College/University, I was at this station requesting a ticket to "Moorfields", having acquired an A-Z and decided that was the best station in Liverpool to visit on my first week ever in the North.

The new look is fabulous, both in keeping with what is there and progressive; but I see that CGI image and a little part of me harks back to trips into Liverpool with drunk student mates, to ventures into the city when I was a new student in the North, to acquiring and losing boyfriends for the first time ever, to weekly trips back to Ormskirk from the (eleven years and counting) bf's to experience Edge Hill student life again. I am sad to see it go. I must visit before it's lost. Before I lose the chance to buy a last minute pack of chewing gum from the kiosk, or to pass my ticket over to the jolly guys on the inspection gate. It's a part of me that is very, very important; pivotal, in fact. Say Ormskirk to me and you are saying my best friends.

Seascape With Figures

I love flexitime; what a great idea. Work hard and we'll give you a day off. Well, work, anyway; you don't have to work too hard, just be there for a long time.

Where am I going with this? Ah, yes. A flexi-day. And what better way to use my time than to get out there and get tarting.

After last time's sort of aimless meandering, I decided to get a bit of purpose to my next trip. This time, I'll wipe out an entire branch of one of the lines. There were a few dinky little branches that seemed suitable, but I plumped for the West Kirby branch of the Wirral line in the end. It was a nice sunny day, and referring to my A-Z, I reckoned I'd be able to hop on and hop off the train and walk between stations.

From the usual start of Birkenhead Park, I was off to Leasowe, and the first level crossing of my tarting. I have a strange, completely irrational dislike of level crossings, and I wish I could explain to you why; I suspect there's a part of me that thinks they just couldn't be bothered building a bridge, and I resent their laziness. Certainly if I was a local it would drive me up the wall having the barriers close every fifteen minutes.

Leasowe station itself was a bit run down, fabricated out of concrete in a style I was rapidly going to become familiar with. Two little waiting shelters, a booking office, and - yes - an ALF:

I snapped the usual exterior pic then wandered off in search of Moreton, the next stop. Little did I know that I was taking my life into my own hands. What seemed to be a nice 1930s housing estate, with a green and semi detached houses, was in fact a teeming cess pit of hazards and perils. How do I know this? Because the Council have signposted the fact:

Oh, the humanity! I poked my head down the road, but I didn't dare venture too far. Yes, it looked like a normal suburban street from where I stood, but no doubt halfway down there was a minefield, probably manned by man-eating lions. The residents of Danger Lane must be trained stuntpeople, who borrow cups of TNT from one another. With their hair on fire. And possibly on unicycles.

Certainly Danger Lane was the most interesting thing so far. Without wanting to be overly critical, Moreton was a mess. A strip of grim, unpleasant shops, most of which had windows covered with mesh even during the day. I was happy to take my picture and scurry down to the platform.

Moreton further blotted its copybook with its ALF.

Look familiar? Fair enough, it's advertising exactly the same feature, but still; there's more to the Wirral coast than a couple of birds. A little feature board on the platform told me that the Wirral Coastal Park featured Leasowe Lighthouse, one of the first brick lighthouses in the world, dating from the 18th Century; a worthy ALF, surely? Or how about Leasowe Castle, a hotel on the sands which has parts dating back to the 16th Century? My friends Mike and Kirsten were married there last year, so I've got plenty of pics of it, if Merseytravel want to get in touch. (Their replacement of Birkenhead Park's board after my criticism has got me feeling bolshie). Certainly anything would be better than those slightly evil looking birds. Orange eyes? Is that necessary?

A whizz along on another train, and I'm at Meols. This town was the bane of my life when I first moved to the Wirral. I could not remember how to pronounce it, ever. Go on, take a guess; you'll never get it. (The 'o' is silent - it rhymes with Shells). For some reason I could not get this pronunciation stuck in my head, and I would cycle through every possible variation before I got to it. This seems to be a Liverpool area habit, possibly to confuse Southerners like me who move here and to mark us out as strangers. I used to go out with someone from Gateacre, which is pronounced Gattaca; I didn't know this until I told a taxi driver to take me there. And the second K in Kirkby is silent, for no apparent reason.

Anyway: Meols. This is where the Wirral Peninsula starts getting a bit posh - it's certainly a step up from Moreton, anyway - and so I was fully expecting an ALF proclaiming some sort of piece of natural beauty. Nothing. I recovered from my disappointment though when I spotted this -

which isn't an ALF, but is an Attractive Local Feature, if you see what I mean. I was surprised to see any kind of gradient indicator, to be honest, as the land round here's pretty flat, as it ambles down towards the Irish Sea.

A further wander along the busy and only semi-attractive Birkenhead Road took me to Manor Road station. I almost missed it though. Unlike all the other stations, this one wasn't on a major thoroughfare, but was tucked away at the end of a street of Victorian villas. And when I say tucked away, I mean tucked away; the entrance to the station was down a narrow alleyway between the last house and the tracks. Hence the slightly constricted look on my face as I try to take a pic with the sign in it.

However, I had just missed the train, so I was left loitering on the platform like a slightly dodgy pervert or a trainspotter (the two things are, of course, linked. And yes, train station spotters are a COMPLETELY different thing. Ahem.) In an homage to my route today, I was listening to local boys The Coral and their Magic and Medicine album, which kept me interested, and I decided to knock off a long distance shot of the station itself - the Manor Road station sign is just noticeable in the background, for MerseyTart pedants:

You can see the house style for this branch of the line in that shot. Apparently, according to Wikipedia (and if it's on the internet it's true; I am that gullible), the stations were refurbished in 1938 when through services to Liverpool started, and you can see that Agatha Christie, clean look in the finishes. It's just a shame that beside getting the silver and yellow corporate paint job, none of the stations seem to have been maintained to much of an extent.

And a trip to Hoylake showed exactly why. This station was tarted up last year when the Open Golf Championships were held at the Royal Liverpool course down the road, and it is a stunningly beautiful station.

Ignore the dodgy businesses in the shop units, and take in that deco sweep, and the London Underground, Charles Holden-esque drum over the ticket office. The ticket office itself is a lovely rotunda:

Yes, there's one of those annoying level crossings at the end of the station, and quite unbelievably, there's not a single ALF on the platform, but that couldn't dispel my pleasure at finding such a gem of a station. Which is why I look so chuffed in the MerseyTart pic, and why I am even more convinced that when I become an eccentric billionaire, I will spend all my money restoring train stations.

It was a shame to leave it, but I had to get to West Kirby (note the lack of a second K!). The houses here were enormous, astonishingly expensive Victorian and Edwardian mansions, built for rich Liverpool merchants and bankers. The contrast with Leasowe's somewhat rundown Danger Lane and its environs was stark. The many golf courses in the area have kept this area of the Wirral severely moneyed.

Its location has also helped. I finally reached West Kirby town centre, and I decided to take in the beach before I got the train home. It was a bit windswept, and though it was warm, it wasn't actually sunny (though in true British style, there were a number of daytrippers out in shorts determined to make the most of the day whatever the weather), but it was beautiful.

A stirring sky above the Dee estuary, and those are the mountains of Wales in the distance. When you say "Liverpool", or "Merseyside", to people, all they think about is crime, or poverty, or industrial ugliness. They don't realise how scenic it is, how it has all this natural beauty to too, and how lucky people who live here really are. Even the beaches are wide, and clean, and sandy, and rarely crowded. I love it here.

Finally I tore myself away from the salty tasting air and wandered back to the station. As you may be able to spot from the photo, the station's fallen on hard times now. It was built as a terminus, and designed as such, but times change, and now the shop units that once lined the entrance are sadly empty. West Kirby station was once even bigger, with a second station next door for a line to Hooton, but that fell prey to Dr Beeching and now there's a leisure centre built on it. But West Kirby does have a little ALF, and bless it for that.

I sat on the platform, tired from my wanderings, but actually pretty happy. I've crossed off an entire branch now! The state of play map is looking pretty good after only a month or so (see below) - in fact, I'm a bit worried I may finish too soon. I'm enjoying this, and I don't want it to finish too quickly. Perhaps I should reconsider my decision not to do the City Lines...