Somebody Stop Me

I don't think there's anything more to be said, really, is there? HELP ME.

Plus One

It's goodbye to intimate shots of my nose hair; yes, for this trip, I have a guest photographer, in the form of The Boyfriend. He's been curious about my little jaunts for a while and now I thought it was safe to let him in on it.

Plus, I needed someone to hold my hand, as today we were venturing into dangerous territory: the North End of Birkenhead. There are some areas that are just more than a little bit intimidating, and the North End is one of them. A council estate clustered around the docks, this is one of the most deprived areas in England, and is certainly not the kind of place that is kind to naive trainspotter types. If I'd been on my own, I'd have been quite intimidated; as it was, I was just apprehensive - after all, we were two unfit homosexuals, so the odds would be against us in a gang fight.

We walked through the estate unmolested, only spotting one tattood thug with a rottweiler, and just the two druggies. Birkenhead North station itself is down a side street, behind a row of burnt out shells of terraced houses - it's clearly going for that hot this season, downtown Basra look. It was at this point that The BF chose to inform me that he had been to this station before, when he was a loyal Liverpool supporter waiting for his train to North Wales, and he had been forced to flee from a baying mob of locals who threw glasses at him. Timing is not his strong suit. We got the pic done in double quick time, and managed to hurl ourselves on the New Brighton bound train.

Today's session was designed to knock off the other northern branch of the Wirral Line: this way everything north of Hamilton Square would be done. As a result the next station was Wallasey Village, which is perched on an embankment. This meant I could get a high level shot which is probably as arty as this site will ever get.

The station name, however, is a complete violation of the Trade Descriptions Act - Wallasey hasn't been a village for decades, and the road away from it was choked with traffic and lined with burger bars and discount shops. Definitely not in picturesque Little England here.

It was barely a ten minute walk to the next station, Wallasey Grove Road, which had a car park and a bus stop and seemed surprisingly busy. It turned out this wasn't because there was a rush of commuters utilising this handy transport hub, but instead it was because there was a cash machine here, and people were turning up in their cars to use it. The station building's vaguely picturesque, but in terms of signposting, the best we could manage was the car park sign; the Merseytravel post you normally see there was way out on the main road, and we needed to dash to catch our train.

Actually, that's slightly misleading; we only needed to dash because of The BF's reticence at passing on information. I was stood on the platform, trying to work out which was the correct one for New Brighton, as a train pulled into the one opposite. It was only then that The BF told me we were on the wrong one - leading to us making a mad dash up the overbridge and hurling ourselves on the train as the doors sidled shut.

So from there it was a reasonably long distance to New Brighton. The view from the train is actually very scenic here - there's a whisk round the corner, and suddenly you can spot the sea, and the beaches. New Brighton is right at the tip of the Wirral, and as the name implies, it was intended to be the North's version of the resorts on the South coast. It was too late to be gentrified, though, and so it headed rapidly downhill, becoming a day trip destination for the workers of Liverpool and Birkenhead.

The station's a pretty impressive terminus, and it was obviously built to handle a large amount of holiday maker traffic. It also featured today's only ALF which, at the request of a Mr JH of Chester, has been framed face on in the pic instead of at my usual jaunty angle:

There were a fair few people disembarking here, as there was some sort of car rally going on on the Parade down by the front; it meant that our wanderings were constantly accompanied by the roar of car engines. This doesn't sound too bad but it's like having a swarm of bees loitering next to your ear. We collected the station though, with The BF doing his best David Bailey impression to try and avoid catching the glare of the sun.

Though it was grey, it was warm, so we walked into the town and down to the front. New Brighton is on its last legs as a resort, and it's a shame. The whole place has the air of having given up being an attraction, and instead is starting to become more and more residential. The main road from the station down to the sea is now lined by small Barratt homes, and a large, impressive looking building on the front has been converted from a nightclub into apartments. The views are still good though, with Liverpool's increasingly impressive skyline in the distance, but everything is tawdry and half-hearted.

Like a lot of people, I have a great fondness for the seaside resort, and I'd like to see them work; but New Brighton doesn't know what to do with itself. While West Kirby, on the other side of the peninsular, has gone the upmarket route, New Brighton's trying to be Blackpool when it just doesn't have the same (dubious) charms. A bowling alley has been built on the front, which is a start, but it's architecturally hideous, and turns its back on the promenade in front.

This aqua amusement arcade has the right idea, showing a bit of glamorous leg, even if its best days were somewhere around the Coronation. If New Brighton had a cinema, perhaps, and a couple of chain restaurants - a Pizza Hut, a Frankie & Benny's - it would get people visiting. No, it wouldn't be classy, but West Kirby does the classy end. I'd rather see this place with a decent history and actual attractions made into a destination again, rather than the depressing retail parks where cinemas and nightclubs are shoved nowadays and which look the same no matter where you are. The latest plans to regenerate the place certainly don't sound promising: constructing a Morrison's supermarket on the front and filling in the Marine Lake to do it. Sorry, did I say unpromising? I meant fucking awful.

Anyway. New Brighton also features Fort Perch Rock, a fortification built to defend the Port of Liverpool from Napoleon, but finished once the Napoleonic Wars were over. It looks pretty good from the outside, and deserves its place on the ALF, but it was two quid to get in and The BF and I are determinedly tight. Plus the sign outside absolutely forbade photography. I think that's just being mean and I have no intention of encouraging that sort of behaviour. I took a picture of the outside though, as a yah-boo-sucks to the killjoys inside, and we moved on.

Back up the hill to the station to go home, going past some pretty villas which obviously once housed terribly rich people but now seem to all be in the process of being chopped up into apartments. There was a single hotel en route, but sadly it seemed to be the kind of place asylum seekers get dumped in rather than a destination.

Instead of going back to Birkenhead North, we continued on to the final station above Hamilton Square: Conway Park. When I first met The BF, many many many years ago, I used to travel every Friday from Ormskirk to Birkenhead Park to see him. On the way, I got to see this station being constructed from the train. It was fascinating to watch it being revealed, a little more each week, peeling away the tunnel around us and forming platforms and circulating areas until finally there was a new, gleaming station waiting for us.

It still does gleam; considering it's now nearly 10 years old, Conway Park still looks pretty clean and tidy. The tunnel roof was opened up when they constructed the station (apparently this is because if the station were underground, the costs of maintaining it would be astronomical) and at its head is a nice, modern looking building. We rode up in the lift to the surface - The BF shamelessly eyeing up a lad in the elevator, the big tart - and then went and stood outside so I could get the name pic. The name, incidentally, is complete rubbish. It was named after the development it's in, even though it's right next to the town centre, and "Birkenhead Market" would not only be far more apt, it would be a lot more attractive. But I expect the developers contributed some money to its construction, and wanted some payback for it. Ho-hum.

So that's another five down, and the whole of the north of the Wirral is wiped out. The map below shows all the stations I still need to do; through use of MS Paint I've wiped out all the ones I've done, like some sort of Nazi commandant (go back into the archive to see what's missing). It still looks like it could be a while before we're complete!

"I love humans. They always see patterns in things that aren't there."

So sayeth the Doctor, and who are we to argue? This is more an accidental tart. I was on my way to work and I managed to miss my train by about 30 seconds, which is rather frustrating. However, making lemonade out of the situation, I turned it into a Tart - and actually, it allowed me to collect a pair.

Full disclosure: I have a teeny, tiny bit of an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I value symmetry above almost anything. I like to see order and structure in things. And I like to find patterns in random things - it makes me feel a whole lot better.

The line from Birkenhead Central to Chester is most familiar to me, because I use it for work every day, and in my head I've sort of divided it up into little slices. Rock Ferry, Green Lane and Birkenhead Central - they are all grouped together as the "urban" stations, all grit and grime. At the other end, there's the pleasing symmetry and sort of inter-related names of Bromborough Rake, Bromborough, and Eastham Rake - something about those three names is just so satisfying to me.

And in the middle, there are the "twin" stations: Bebington and Port Sunlight. Both stations are up on viaducts, they're pretty simple at platform level, and they both serve the Port Sunlight village - viz:

In full OCD mode, can I say how much I love that they swapped "Port Sunlight Village" and "Lady Lever Art Gallery" over between signs? It was probably done for some tedious geographical reason, but I like to think that the man in charge of ALFs just wanted to make it interesting. (However, he'd lost his inspiration by the time he got to the Evil Repeating Birds of Leasowe & Moreton).

So I started at Bebington, my usual departure station. The light was bad, and it was extremely difficult to get in a position, which is how I ended up under the bridge, and... well basically, this is one big apology for the shittiness of this shot. I'm sorry Bebington. I let you down.

Anyway, onwards and upwards. It's a straight line from Bebington to Port Sunlight - the road follows the railway embankment - but I took a diversion and wandered through the village itself. (As you may have deduced, I was in no hurry to get to work). If you're not familiar with Port Sunlight, it was built to house the workers for the Lever factory in the village - yes, that's Sunlight as in Sunlight soap. The Lever family constructed a whole town for the employees, with a pub, village hall, church - even an art gallery. This was just for the rank and file; the managers were housed in Thornton Hough, which is further down the Wirral and is like a Disney English village - everything is designed to look like it's been there since Ye Olde Days, even though it's only about a hundred years old.

The whole village is now a conservation area, and they are incredibly strict about preserving it, as they should. Normally I hate new buildings that pretend they're old. Chester is full of them and they make me want to scream. If it's the twenty-first century, build a twenty-first century building, and don't shove a load of mock-Tudor bobbins all over it. Somehow, though, Port Sunlight gets away with trying to look older than it is. Perhaps it's their social significance. The houses must have been astonishing for the factory workers at the turn of the century, people who were used to slum conditions. In fact they're better than some houses being built today. At least these ones have space and light and room to breathe. You don't get that on a Brookside estate. And can you imagine employers building a village for their employees now, or if they did, actually making it somewhere you'd want to live?

If you get the opportunity, do go and take Port Sunlight in. The Lady Lever Art Gallery does some very nice cakes. There; now you have no reason not to go.

Anyway, I eventually had to drag myself away and go to the station. It was built in keeping with the village, though it was actually constructed some time later, and it's lovely; like a little country cottage. It's also amazing what a difference a few hanging baskets make.

In fact it's so nice I now feel doubly guilty about how crappy Bebington looks next to it. I might have to revisit I think.

Map! Part Deux

As an update, here's where we are so far with the Merseyrail map. Two branches are completely done, which is pleasing, but the Southport line hasn't been touched at all, and even though I travel on it every day to work, the only station south of Birkenhead Park that's been tarted is Bache. 18 are done, leaving 49 to go, and I've been doing a lot of easy ones so far. Plus with the Mysterious Train Wheel Problem, services have been cut down - so going forward, things can only get more difficult.

Overflated Opinion of Oneself

I'm sorry, I really am. I had no idea that my galloping round the railway network of Liverpool would cause such damage. No sooner had I started my little quest than Merseyrail trains immediately start going mad (http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100regionalnews/tm_headline=weeks-of-rail-chaos-facing-commuters%26method=full%26objectid=19674972%26siteid=50061-name_page.html). The network operators are baffled as to what is causing all this; I'm choosing to believe that it's my legions of fans following my trail and riding the rails in hope of a glimpse of the MerseyTart.

Clearly under such circumstances I should cease and desist from using the network. I feel guilty now. Especially as I only went out last week. If you are the type of person who copies stuff they read on the internet, stop reading now! You're putting lives in danger!!!

I'd been thinking; my trip along the Northern Line previously had ended at St Michael's, in the south of the city. A little consultation of my trusty A-Z told me that finishing off the last few stations on the southern branch of the line wouldn't be too difficult - a couple of hours work, maybe. So I trotted out last week.

Unfortunately, I forgot about Sunday services. Grr. Trains only on the half hour, instead of fifteen minutes. The upshot was that I ended up loitering in Liverpool Central's bowels for half an hour while I waited for the next southbound train. To add insult to injury, a girl came and stood next to me and consumed what looked like half a tonne of fried chicken. It smelt repulsive. I could practically hear the cholesterol swimming into her veins.

I was glad when the train finally turned up and spirited me off to Aigburth (actually pronounced Eggberth, obviously). I have only limited experience of this end of the line, so I didn't really know where I was, but I was pleased to see that we had another Victorian country station building - one which had been carefully modernised, with automatic doors, but still retaining the charm. It also had an ALF.

I'm starting to get a bit bored of birds now. After the double whammy of Moreton & Leasowe's Evil Crane Type Things (note: I am not Bill Oddie), a slightly bemused looking seagull is not much of a draw. Otterspool Promenade is a relatively breezy strip of parkland beside the river, and while it's very pretty, seagulls are not really a feature worth seeking out. I'm tempted to write to Merseytravel and see who comes up with these things, and to ask if they have more reference material on their desk other than The Big Book Of British Seabirds.

The weather was excessively grey and threatening to rain, but it was warm, too, as I strolled along. The soundtrack for today's trip was Madonna's Erotica; either this signalled that I was going to spend my Sunday afternoon plunging into a world of kinky sado-masochistic sex, or alternatively, I was just enjoying the contrast between the straight laced Victorian surroundings and Madge's potty mouth. (It was on this trip that I first realised that Waiting finishes with the lines Next time you want pussy/Just look in the mirror baby - which I have to say I found hysterical).

I wasn't entirely sure where Cressington station was - wherever possible, I prefer to follow my nose, only turning to my A-Z when I feel lost. I have quite a good instinct for geography, with an inbuilt compass, though it occasionally gets me into trouble. I once walked from London Bridge to Bermondsey station on the Jubilee Line, not long after it opened, and I found myself in the centre of an estate of high rise flats with absolutely no idea of where I was. I trusted my instinct, and kept walking, and ended up almost bumping into Bermondsey station, but it was a slightly nervy time up until then.

I kept walking, assuming there would be a sign pointing me in the right direction, and there was. But it was a bit confusing; it seemed to be pointing into a park. Intrigued, I wandered through the elaborate Victorian gateway and into what turned out to be a private estate and a conservation area.


Apparently, during the 19th century, wealthy Liverpool businessmen established Grassendale and Cressington Parks, then built themselves some large, exclusive villas in the middle. I was simultaneously delighted to find this little suburb and annoyed. Delighted, because the architecture was lovely; big, attractive mansions, on tree lined streets. Annoyed, because of the signs like the one above, which struck me as just horribly snooty. I received some extremely dirty looks from an elderly couple climbing out of their car to go inside as they clearly disapproved of the riff raff who had the temerity to wander into their estate. Newsflash: public transport is for the public, and even if it isn't a right of way, technically, I absolutely have the right to wander into it. Live with it.


Fortunately Cressington Station made up for it. As was to be expected, it was a lovely little building, in keeping with the estate around it, and better still, it was utterly deserted. Not even a ticket inspector. I had a little wander around, taking in nice little features like this old water fountain, and the overbridge, which felt impossibly high because of the cutting, and induced a little vertigo attack in me.



Then a train came up, and spoilt my fun, and took me to Liverpool South Parkway. Never mind Doctor Who; this was a trip from the past into the future with just a train ride. From Victorian to modern Elizabethan in one trip, Liverpool South Parkway is only a year or two old, and it screams modernity from every pore. Built to serve the airport, it's like an airport itself, with soaring glass and massive metal braces. The station was built by combining Garston (on the Northern Line) with Allerton (on the City Line) into one complex, and it was strange to see. I once worked near Garston station for a time, and took the train there daily; it was another nineteenth century relic, tucked away down a back street - not a gleaming epic of Norman Foster-inspired transportation. I loved it, but I suspect I'm in a minority about this, because frankly, the thing was deserted. This massive transport complex - as you can see, there's a bus interchange outside - was playing host to around a dozen passengers. There were members of staff just milling, aimlessly. Well, not completely aimlessly; they were also eyeing up my photography with suspicion, as though I were a potential suicide bomber planning where to set off my waistcoat. Which is why the shots are a little blurry - I was snapping them quick, before fifty armed SAS men descended.

And from there, I went to Hunts Cross, walking around Allerton cemetary and through fag end suburban streets. It couldn't help but be a disappointment after the two previous stations, and it was; the station building you see behind me in the pic is now a pub, and was filled that afternoon with Liverpool fans getting hammered loudly. They had spilled out onto the pavement - the downside of the smoking ban is that this kind of drunken behaviour has now been carried out onto the street so they can have their Silk Cut and their Becks - and so I snapped a pic and hurried to the platform through the disappointing 80s box of a ticket office.

The station was drab, the end of the line in all senses, and frankly, I was glad to be going home before the rain finally gave in and hammered down. The plus side is, I've crossed off the branch from the map - so I'll never have to see it again...

(And a quick thank you, by the way, to Sue the very lovely Tubewhore herself, who gave me a gratuitous plug on her site!)

Unexpected Historical Tarting

This, chaps, is the moment when this website takes over my life. Read it and weep.

It's a pleasant Sunday and the BF suggests we go out somewhere. "Where do you want to go?" he asks.

This is where I suggested.

It violated every part of the MerseyTart ethos. We drove there! There are no trains! It's not even on Merseyside! And yet, and yet...

Hadlow Road used to be part of the Hooton to West Kirby railway that I mentioned in my last post - the one that was lifted in the Sixties. Most of it was turned into a long linear park, the Wirral Way, but here at Hadlow Road, they preserved the station as it was in the 50s. It was very pretty, though sadly the ticket office was locked up; we squinted through the windows and could see a genuine Railway Children-esque waiting room, complete with fireplace.

There was also a signal box. Can't get excited about signal boxes I'm afraid. I'm taking that as a positive sign that I'm not a real trainspotter. Still, at least now I have pics of me on here that don't just give you an intimate interior view of my nostrils!

This is not establishing a precedent. I need to stay focused!

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...