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Trafford Park

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Trafford Park is an area of the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford, in Greater Manchester, England. Located immediately south of Salford Quays, on the southern side of the Manchester Ship Canal, it is west-southwest of Manchester City Centre, and north of Stretford.

Trafford Park is almost entirely surrounded by water. The Bridgewater Canal forms its southeastern and southwestern boundaries, and the Manchester Ship Canal forms its northeastern and northwestern boundaries. The park occupies an area of , and is the site of a large industrial estate, the first planned industrial estate in the world, and the largest in Europe. There are over 1,400 companies within the park, employing an estimated 44,000 people. At its peak in 1945, there were an estimated 75,000 workers employed.

History

Pre-industrial

Until the industrial development of the park began, in the late 19th century, much of the area now known as Trafford Park was a "beautifully timbered deer park". It was formerly the ancestral estate of the family that has lent its name to the area, the de Trafford family, one of the most ancient families in England. Sometime between 1672 and 1720, the de Traffords moved from the home that they had occupied since 1017, in what is now known as Old Trafford, to what was then called Whittleswick Hall, which they renamed Trafford Hall. Their new home was a little to the east of where Tenax Circle is now, at the northwestern end of Trafford Park Road.

Trafford Park contained the hall, its grounds, and three farms: Park Farm, Moss Farm, and Waters Meeting Farm. There were three entrance lodges to the park, at Throstle Nest, Old Trafford, and Barton-upon-Irwell. The Old Trafford entrance lodge is the only one to have survived, having been relocated from its original position opposite what is today the White City retail park to become the entrance to Gorse Hill Park. An old map shows the whole area as Trafford Heath, and inside it a smaller Trafford Park.

In 1761, a section of the Bridgewater Canal was built along the southeast and southwest sides of Trafford Park. Along with the River Irwell, marking the estate's northern boundary, that gave the park its present-day "island-like" quality. In about 1860, an ornamental lake was added to the park. It became filled with foundry waste and builders' rubble during the mid-20th century, but what remains of the lake is now the centrepiece of the Trafford Ecology Park.

In 1882, a meeting held at the Didsbury home of engineer Daniel Adamson began the estate's transformation, with the creation of the Manchester Ship Canal committee. Sir Humphrey de Trafford was an implacable opponent of the proposed canal. He objected, amongst other things, that it would bring polluted water close to his residence, interfere with his drainage, and render Trafford Hall uninhabitable, forcing him to "give up his home and leave the place". In spite of Sir Humphrey's opposition, the Ship Canal Bill became law on 6 August 1885, after two previous Bills had failed to get through Parliament. However, the construction of the canal did not begin until 1888, more than two years after Sir Humphrey had died.

The Manchester Ship Canal was opened in 1894, making Trafford Park a prime site for industrial development. During the following century, the park was built over with factories and some housing for workers. Neither the deer park nor the ancestral home of the de Trafford family, Trafford Hall, survived its 20th-century industrialisation.

Early development

On 7 May 1896, Sir Humphrey Francis de Trafford put the estate up for auction, but it failed to reach its reported reserve price of £300,000. There was much public debate, before and after the abortive sale, as to whether Manchester Corporation ought to buy Trafford Park, but the corporation could not agree terms quickly enough, and so on 23 June 1896 Ernest Terah Hooley became the new owner of Trafford Park, for the sum of £360,000.

On 17 August 1896, Hooley formed Trafford Park Estates Ltd, transferring his ownership of the park to the new company – of which he was the chairman and a significant shareholder – at a substantial profit. The initial plans for the estate included a racetrack, exclusive housing, and a cycle works, along with the development of the Ship Canal frontage for "all types of trade including timber". By that time the ship canal had been open for two years, but the predicted traffic had yet to materialise. Hooley met with Marshall Stevens, the general manager of the Ship Canal Company. Both men recognised the benefit that the industrial development of Trafford Park could offer to the ship canal, and the ship canal to the estate. In January 1897, Stevens became the managing director of Trafford Park Estates.

Like any commercial enterprise, Trafford Park Estates had to generate an income for its investors. The company chose not to construct buildings for letting, but instead to lease land for development by the tenant. However, it could not afford simply to wait for prospective tenants to come forward, and so the park's existing assets had to be made use of in the meantime. Trafford Hall was opened as a hotel in 1899, to serve prospective industrialists considering a move to the park, along with their key employees. It had 40 bedrooms, available to "Gentlemen only". The hall's stables and some other outbuildings were used for stock auctions and selling horses, from 1900–1902, and the ornamental lake was leased to William Crooke and Sons, for use as a boating lake, initially on a five-year lease. The lake continued to be used for leisure activities until the 1930s. A polo ground was set up in the park, and of land near the hall were leased to the Manchester Golf Club, who laid out a three-mile (4.8 km) long course. The club moved from Trafford Park to a new site at Hopwood Park in 1912. All of the open-field land uses were subsequently pushed out by industry.

Industrialisation

Among the first industries to arrive was the Manchester Patent Fuel Company, in 1898. The Trafford Brick Company arrived soon after, followed by J.W Southern & Co. (timber merchants), James Gresham (engineers), and W.T. Glovers & Co. (electric cable manufacturers). Glovers also built a power station in the park, on the banks of the Bridgewater Canal. Most of these early developments were built on the eastern side of the park, with the rest remaining largely undeveloped.

The first American company to arrive was Westinghouse, which formed its British subsidiary – British Westinghouse Electric Company – in 1899, and purchased on two sites. Building work started in 1900, and the factory began production in 1902, making turbines and electric generators. By the following year, British Westinghouse was employing approximately half of the 12,000 workers in Trafford Park. Its main machine shop was long and wide; for almost 100 years Westinghouse's Trafford Park works was the most important engineering facility in Britain. In 1919, Westinghouse renamed itself Metropolitan-Vickers.

In 1903, the Cooperative Wholesale Society (CWS), bought land at Trafford Wharf and set up a large food packing factory and a flour mill. Other companies to arrive at that time included Kilverts (making lard), the Liverpool Warehousing Company, and Lancashire Dynamo & Crypto Ltd.

The second major American company to set up a manufacturing base in Trafford Park was the Ford Motor Company, in 1911. Initially Ford used its factory as an assembly plant for the Model T, but other vehicles were assembled there in later years. Ford moved to Dagenham in 1931, returning temporarily to Trafford Park during the Second World War, when it manufactured Rolls-Royce Merlin engines under licence.

By 1933, over 300 American companies had bases in Trafford Park, and that number was added to when, in 1938, the Kellogg company opened a large industrial complex at Barton Dock. Kellogg's remains a significant presence in the park.

Second World War

During the Second World War, Trafford Park was largely turned over to the production of war materiel, including the Avro Manchester heavy bomber, and the Rolls-Royce Merlin engines used to power both the Spitfire and the Lancaster. The engines were made by Ford, under licence. The 17,316 workers employed in the factory produced 34,000 engines. As an important industrial area, the park suffered from extensive bombing, particularly during the Manchester Blitz of December 1940. On the night of 23 December 1940, the Metropolitan-Vickers aircraft factory in Mosley Road was badly damaged, with the loss of 13 Avro Manchester bombers in final assembly. Trafford Hall was also severely damaged, and it was demolished shortly after the war ended.

At the outbreak of war in 1939, there were an estimated 50,000 workers employed in the park. By the end of the war, in 1945, that number had risen to 75,000, which was probably the peak size of the park's workforce. Metropolitan-Vickers alone employed 26,000 workers.

Decline and regeneration

In the 1960s, employment in the park began to decline, as companies closed their premises in favour of newer, more efficient plants elsewhere. In 1971, Stretford Council responded to the decline by setting up the Trafford Park Industrial Council (TRAFIC), membership of which was open to any firm in Trafford Park. One of TRAFIC's early initiatives was to encourage businesses in the park to address its general air of decay, by improving their own areas through landscaping and other environmental improvements.

Governance

Civic history

The eastern area of the park, where the first developments took place, was under the local government control of Stretford Urban District; the west was controlled by the urban district of Barton-upon-Irwell. It was not long before tensions began to emerge between the Estates Company and Stretford Council over the provision of local services and infrastructure. In 1902, W. T. Glover & Co, a cable manufacturing company that had moved to the park from nearby Salford, built a power station next to their works to supply electricity to the rest of the park; the Estates Company had previously approached Manchester Corporation, but Stretford would not allow another local authority to supply electricity within its area.

Political representation

Since 1997, Trafford Park has been in the constituency of Stretford and Urmston. Beverley Hughes, a member of the Labour Party, has been the MP since the constituency was created. At the 2005 General Election, Hughes won the seat with a majority of 7,851, representing 51.0% of the vote. The Conservatives took 30.4% of the vote, the Liberal Democrats 14.0%, the Respect Party 2.5%, and the United Kingdom Independence Party 2.2%.

Geography

Trafford Park is either flat or gently undulating, around above sea level at its highest point. The local bedrock is Triassic Bunter Sandstone, overlaid by sand and gravel deposited during the last ice age, around 10,000 years ago. There are some areas of peat in the west of the park, in the area formerly known as Trafford Moss.

Trafford Park Village

In 1898, a large plot of land was sold to Edmund Nuttall & Co., for the construction of 1,200 houses. The houses were never built, but the land later became the site of Trafford Park Village, known locally simply as the Village. The announced arrival of the Westinghouse factory acted a spur to development, and so in 1899, Trafford Park Dwellings Ltd was formed, with the aim of providing housing for the anticipated influx of new workers. Nuttall's land was acquired, and by 1903 over 500 houses had been built. When the development was completed in 1904 there were over 700 houses. In 1907 it was estimated that the population of the Village was 3,060.

The development was laid out in a grid pattern, with the roads being numbered instead of being named. Avenues numbered 1 to 4 ran north–south, and streets numbered 1 to 12 ran east–west. The Village was almost self-contained, with its own public hall, post office, churches, police station, school, social club, and sports facilities. However, its design attracted some criticism from the start; the streets were narrow, with few gardens, and the whole development was close to the pollution of the neighbouring industries. In that respect, it resembled the terraced properties in the surrounding areas, many of which were condemned as slums in later years. By the 1970s the Village was also considered by Stretford Council to be a slum area, and unsuitable for residential housing. In the first phase of clearance, in the mid-1970s, 298 houses were demolished. A further 325 houses were demolished in the early 1980s, leaving only the largest 84 houses remaining.

Landmarks

The Imperial War Museum North, opened on 5 July 2002, is in Trafford Wharf, on the southern edge of the ship canal looking over towards Salford Quays. It was designed by Daniel Libeskind, and is an example of deconstructivist architecture. The building consists of three interlocking sections: the air shard, the earth shard, and the water shard, representing a world torn apart by conflict. The air shard is in height, and has a gallery level offering views across Salford and the Quays towards Manchester city centre. The museum houses two extensive exhibition spaces. The largest is dedicated to the permanent exhibition covering conflicts from 1900 to the present day; the second space is used for special exhibitions.

Trafford Ecology Park

The Trafford Ecology Park is what remains of Trafford Park's ornamental boating lake. Boating continued on the lake until the 1930s, but by then its water had become polluted by asbestos and oil seepage from the neighbouring Anglo American Oil depot. During the Second World War the site was used as a tip for foundry waste. In 1974, Esso bought the land and levelled and partly seeded it, to improve the frontage to its own site. Trafford council bought the land from Esso in 1983, for £50,000. Government spending restrictions delayed the park's restoration and conversion, so it was not fully opened to the public until 1990.

The present lake is about one-third of its original size. Although relatively small, the park supports a wide variety of wildlife, including foxes, weasels, rabbits, hedgehogs, lapwings, kestrels, herons, coot, Canada Geese, and several varieties of newt. In 2007, the park was designated a Local Nature Reserve, one of only two in Trafford.

Transport

At the end of the 19th century, there were no public transport routes in, or running close to, Trafford Park. Its size meant that the Estates Company was obliged to provide some means of travelling around the park, and so a gas-powered tramway was commissioned, with the intention that the track could be used both for carrying people and freight. The first tram ran on 23 July 1897, but after a few days of operation there was an accident in which a tramcar was derailed, and the service was suspended until the following year. A separate electric tramway was installed in 1903, but the gas trams continued to run until 1908, when they were replaced by steam locomotives. Additional railway lines were soon built in the park, and linked to the Manchester Ship Canal's railway system. The Trafford Park Company was set up in 1904, as a result of the Trafford Park Act of that year, with responsibility for all of the park's roads and railways. The railway network could subsequently be extended as required, without the need to seek additional permissions from Parliament. At its peak, the estate's railway network covered 26 route miles (42 km), handling about 2.5 million tons (2.54 million t) of cargo in 1940. Like the rest of the park though, it fell into decline during the 1960s, exacerbated by the increasing use of road transport, and it was closed in 1998.

Manchester's first aerodrome was on a site between Trafford Park Road, Mosley Road, and Ashburton Road. The first plane landed there on 7 July 1911, flown from Liverpool by Henry G. Melly. The aerodrome continued to be used until the early years of the First World War, and possibly until 1918, when it was replaced by the Alexandra Park Aerodrome. Today, Tenax Road runs north–south through the centre of the site.

See also

References

Notes

Bibliography

External links



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