Fontenoy Gardens c1970

Prefabs off Scotland Road, c1970

Following my recent posts on tenements and prefabs, Peter Leeson has sent me two of the photographs he took while working for Vauxhall Community Development Project. In 1969, Peter gave up a secure job with the City Council Planning Department to record the devastating changes that were being inflicted on the Scotland Road community by the construction of the Wallasey Tunnel. A whole neighbourhood was split in half by the roadworks and Peter’s photographs (and film Us and Them) were the community’s attempt to express their feelings about the enforced changes to its life. I published many of the photographs in Goodbye Scottie Road, a book of Peter’s photographs that also includes fascinating photographs of other aspects of Liverpool from the same period.
The two photographs show the depressing state of public housing. The fabric of Fontenoy Gardens looks well and truly shot. Only major expenditure could reverse its decline and that was not forthcoming. The second photograph shows the last of the prefabs off Scotland Road (St Anthony’s Church can be seen in the background). Neither of the two images appeared in the book – Peter felt they were too depressing.

Byrom Street/Cartwright Place 1950s

For me, the most interesting news item over Christmas was the revelation that Geoffrey Howe had advocated the managed decline of Liverpool following the Toxteth Riots. I wasn’t particularly surprised by the ‘shock’ headlines, there had been suggestions soon after the Riots that the Government had been advocating a market forces strategy with Liverpool. What I did find intriguing is that a policy of managed decline only came into Cabinet discussions in 1981 – I thought that Liverpool’s whole post-War history had been planned to scale down the city.
Certainly the effects of wartime bombing had seriously damaged the city’s housing stock and infrastructure. Rebuilding in the immediate post-War period was frustrated by a chronic shortage of building materials and Liverpool limped through the 1950s attempting to reinstate its docks, city centre and housing. But there is more than a sneaking suspicion that the damage to the city had created a canvas that the politicians and planners could work with. Road schemes proposed in the pre-War years could become a reality and the ideas for a grandiose civic centre and new zones for shopping and business could take centre stage. (Not only in Liverpool, in Coventry the City Architect, Donald Gibson, the bombing was “a blessing in disguise. The Jerries cleared out the core of the (medieval) city, a chaotic mess, and we can start anew.”) Alderman Shennan, a practising architect and Chairman of the Planning Committee was a strong advocate of clearing out much of old Liverpool and creating a car-friendly transport system that would take out whole historic areas when implemented. In tandem, the city’s housing and industry was to be revamped by a dual policy of creating satellite towns in Kirkby, Skelmersdale, Speke, Runcorn and Northwich and by demolishing whole neighbourhoods to make way for tower block living.
This is an over-simplification but the policies led to a near halving of Liverpool’s population in less than forty years. If that wasn’t managed decline, I am not sure what is. Yet Liverpool is still officially England’s poorest city. Some management! The tragedy is that the voice of the people is never heard. It is left to a small handful of experts to impose their plans and, as has been shown time after time, they are deeply flawed in their assumptions (high rise living, new towns, importing large-scale industry which subsequently failed, destroying historic buildings for no gain). What I would like to see is a Royal Commission on the future of our cities and have a proper discussion about the future shape and function of Liverpool and its counterparts. It might take years to come to its conclusions but it would focus attention on so many pressing issues.
To illustrate one aspect of my point, the first photograph is of Byrom Street in the 1950s – a cobbled street with buildings of character, wide pavements for pedestrians and an efficient transport system. Below is an aerial view from 1964 showing a central block of buildings sandwiched between the Technical College (on the left – now part of Liverpool Museum) and the offices of Blackburn Assurance on the right. The next photograph captures this block in preparation for demolition to make way for road widening from the Mersey Tunnel. Finally, the 1978 photograph showing the end result. All character has been removed in favour of the motor car and the wide pavements reduced to a precarious sloping strip relegating the pedestrian to an afterthought. Geoffrey Howe couldn’t have done better!

Byrom Street 1964

Byrom Street 1966

Byrom Street 1978

Two photographs from a family album. Taken in May, 1899, they illustrate a probably typical outing to Stanley Park. The top photograph shows a busy boating lake with everyone dressed up in their Sunday best. The young man, possibly the photographer on a self-timer, poses with top hat and cane in the bottom photo.
I visited Stanley Park a few years ago, intending to take a few shots for a book on architecture. After only a few steps, I turned round and returned to the car having caught sight of a large group of young men with unfriendly-looking dogs hanging out around the dilapidated, seemingly beyond repair Conservatory. Not a place to wander with an expensive camera hung around my neck.
Forward to last Summer and what a change! The restoration of the pavilions, terraces and gardens have brought the park back from the brink. With a welcoming café in the restored conservatory, the whole aspect of the park, overlooking the Mersey, is a revelation. Stanley Park was opened in 1870, two years after Newsham Park and two years before Sefton Park. Away from the salubrious areas that allowed impressive villas to be built to offset the cost as was the case with both Newsham and Sefton Parks, Stanley Park was somewhat the neglected link in the chain of green spaces that the Victorians constructed to give the people of the town a taste of the countryside. In the wake of the cholera and typhoid epidemics of the 1840s and 50s, Liverpool had pioneered public parks and their survival and development is a magnificent part of our heritage which, as the photographs show, has been appreciated for the best part of 150 years.

The scene is little changed today – although the boat house has been replaced by an impressive modern cafe´.
I need a clothing expert to date these three photographs. My suspicion is that they are late 1890s/early 1900s but they could be earlier. The December of 1890 was the coldest on record until this month, so possibly the photographer was recording that severe winter. The lake is well and truly frozen over – with no Health and Safety worries for the dozens of skaters taking advantage. (I particularly like the photograph of the young girls letting their hair down).
Clearly, from the warm outfits, this was mainly a middle-class day out. It is shocking to think that there were thousands of children walking around with bare feet only a few miles away but Liverpool really was a tale of two cities.

New Brighton 1889

Sefton Park 1889

While sorting out my lantern slides for further pictures of the Dingle to follow on from yesterday’s post, I noticed that the Sefton Park slide was dated February 11th, 1889. A few days too late for its anniversary, perhaps, but worth remembering that they had hard winters back then (and coped with them a lot better). The two photographs were both taken by N. Stephen, who also photographed the children carrying beer mugs in an earlier post. I have had difficulty pinpointing any real details about Stephen. The only match in Gore’s Directory (1910) is of a Nathan Stephen of 22 Russian Drive, Stoneycroft. Stephen is listed as a County Court officer, so was presumably relatively well-paid. Hand-held cameras had just been introduced in the late 1880s, so Stephen was an early proponent. The advent of hand-held cameras and roll film were to democratise photography. Even so, it still wasn’t a cheap hobby and it would take a further ten years or more before it became a truly mass medium.
If anyone has more information on Stephen, I would be grateful. It is good to give credit when due, however belatedly.