Vestiges of the Pre-Urban Landscape in the Suburban Geography of South Manchester 4 Keith Sutton
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Vestiges of the pre-urban landscape in the suburban geography of South Manchester 4 Keith Sutton Introduction first chapel was erected about 1512, probably by One can see the suburban sprawl around cities as the Barlows, and was replaced by a brick church in a largely featureless and homogeneous landscape 1779-80, to be enlarged in 1837. with street after street of similar houses. In a By the time of Chorlton’s Tithe Survey in 1847 conurbation such as Greater Manchester, suburbs the village was a rural backwater set in its fields, coalesce into an apparent sea of houses punctu- orchards and woodland copses. Its population had ated by occasional shopping centres or out-of- risen to only 619 in 1811 and to 761 by the 1851 town industrial/commercial estates. This notion census. What is now South Manchester was then a of faceless anonymous suburbia was challenged scatter of villages, hamlets and farms. Other 1840s by David Ward (1962) in his study of the relation- settlement centres included Stretford, Withington, ship between the pre-urban cadastre and the Didsbury, Burnage and Northenden, plus several contemporary urban patterns of Leeds’ suburbs. halls. To Hough End Hall and Barlow Hall can The pre-urban land ownership patterns, revealed be added Longford Hall, Wythenshawe Hall by the Tithe Surveys of the 1840s, together with and Baguley Hall, revealing the mid-nineteenth the pre-urban settlement and road network, century social hierarchy. Transport links to the influenced the emerging urban landscape in terms emerging industrial centre of Manchester were of street alignments and the micro-morphology poor and slow, mainly using rural lanes through of the built-up area. The degree of fragmentation what became Whalley Range and Moss Side of the suburban morphology in some parts of to Stretford and Chester Roads. Less direct but Leeds contrasted with the more standardised probably quicker was the lane to Stretford with its large estates where the internal urban layout was Bridgewater Canal transport link and, from 1849, more independent of earlier landscape features. A its new railway station link to central Manchester. similar relationship between urban patterns and Some early lanes were later to evolve into major the pre-urban cadastre can be found across South roads like Barlow Moor Lane and Moss Lane. To Manchester with Chorlton-cum-Hardy serving as the south the River Mersey was a barrier and a a case study. flood threat rather than a transport link. Anglo-Saxon origins can be postulated for the The focus of Chorlton in 1847 was Beech place-names Chorlton (Ceorlatun) and Hardy Lane and Chorlton Green with the parish (Ard-Eea). The township’s most noteworthy church and one or two inns. Figure 1 shows building, Hough End Hall, was built for the the pre-1870 housing development around the Mosley Family in 1596, probably on the site of an Green, along Beech Road and northwards along earlier house. Barlow Hall may date back earlier, High Lane. This early ‘Old Chorlton’ develop- being rebuilt in 1584. The associated estate was ment was supplemented after the 1880 arrival of bought by the Egertons of Tatton in the 1770s. The Chorlton’s rail connection to Manchester Central 4: The suburban geography of South Manchester 37 N Manchester Stretford Railway Red Station (1849) Gates 0 10 ED STATUTE CHAINS GE LA Martledge NE W I LB RA HA Chorlton M Railway Station H (1880) IG RO H AD L A (1 Chorlton N 869 Green E ) Bridgewater Horse and Jockey Inn Canal B Church E Methodist E C Inn Chapel H L A N E (R oa d) M O SS L A N E ( Sa nd y L Park an Lime e) Brow Farm River Mersey Bank B A R L Oak O House W Hough End Hall M O O R L A N E River Mersey Hardy House Hardy Farm Didsbury Southern Cemetery (1879) Figure 1: 1847 settlement features. 38 Manchester Geographies Station by ‘New Chorlton’ with commercial Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway a and residential development focused on the route in to Central Station via the 1880 Cheshire Wilbraham Road–Barlow Moor Road crossroads Lines Committee line. Intermediate stations were which became the main centre of the emerging opened in 1892 at Alexandra Park (later renamed suburb. Commuting links to Manchester by train Wilbraham Road), Fallowfield and Levenshulme. were soon supplemented by horse omnibus These commuter stations functioned until the routes, tramlines and bus services. Manchester’s 1960s closures; Chorlton station closed in 1967. first horse omnibus service started in 1824 from Chorlton’s road links were further enhanced Pendleton to Market Street. By 1850, 64 omnibuses in 1932 when Princess Parkway was opened, with were running in the city. Turnpike trust roads and a new bridge over the River Mersey. The develop- later municipal road widening and straightening ment of Manchester’s overspill and erstwhile permitted large horse buses, carrying up to 40 garden suburb of Wythenshawe then commenced. passengers, and later, horse tramways to link An interesting footnote to Chorlton’s transport Manchester’s suburbs to the city centre. In 1880 development was the brief existence of Hough two operating companies were amalgamated into End Aerodrome or Alexandra Park Aerodrome. the Manchester Carriage and Tramways Company. Opened as a military aerodrome in May 1918 until By 1895 the Manchester Corporation was resolved May 1919, this then functioned as a civil airfield to take over the tramways and operate them as until September 1924 with flights to London’s an electric system. However, lightly used routes in Croydon Airport, Southport, Blackpool and Southern Manchester, such as Hulme to Chorlton- Amsterdam, though it was costly to hire aircraft cum-Hardy and Brooks Bar to Southern Cemetery, for such flights. The adjacent railway line and were still being operated by horse buses in 1905. Alexandra Park station allowed the rail transport From 1906 motor buses were first used and from of aircraft parts from Newton Heath and Stockport 1929 they replaced the first abandoned tramway for assembly at the site (Worthington, 2014, p. 319). routes. This transformation of Chorlton from an 1840s By now Chorlton was linked to the tram village with a few poor rural lanes to Stretford and system. In 1903 the tram route from Belle Vue Manchester, to an early twentieth-century suburb via Brooks Bar and Upper Chorlton Road was with a choice of rail, tram and bus services to both extended to West Point at Seymour Grove; in the city centre and to other suburbs engendered 1907 this was extended to Lane End, that is the the rapid spread of the built-up area. junction of Barlow Moor Road and Sandy Lane. This tram line was further extended to Southern Suburban housing development Cemetery in 1911 and then to Didsbury in 1913. The sequence of nineteenth-century and Chorlton Tram Terminus, later the Bus Terminus, twentieth-century urban developments now finds was opened in May 1915. From Whalley Range the expression in the ‘Age of Buildings’ cartography tram service along Alexandra Road was extended of Chorlton (Figure 2). The pre-1870 category to Egerton Road in 1913, though the railway reflects the pre-railway original village of Chorlton bridge had to be strengthened to allow this line to focused on the Green, on Beech Lane/Road and link up with the Barlow Moor to Didsbury line. on Edge Lane plus a handful of isolated farms This tram network fed and supplemented the and cottages. Between 1870 and 1914 the village suburban railway service opened on 1st January becomes a suburb focused on the railway station 1880 between Central Station and Stockport, with and the new commercial centre aligned along stations at Chorlton, Withington and Didsbury. the Wilbraham Road and the Barlow Moor Road- The South Junction Line, from Fairfield in East Manchester Road axes. Late Victorian housing Manchester to Chorlton Junction, gave the development along Corkland Road, Egerton Road, 4: The suburban geography of South Manchester 39 AGE OF BUILDINGS Pre–1800 1800–1870 1870–1890 1890–1920 Part of 1920–1939 Longford Park 1939–1972 Park Ch orlto n Brook River Mersey N Chorlton Golf Course Playing Field 0 1 MILE Figure 2: Age of buildings map. 40 Manchester Geographies Oswald Road and Ivygreen Road contrasts with A noteworthy feature was the absence so far the 1914-1939 houses along Buckingham Road, of the major north-south axis of Princess Parkway, Manley Road and King’s Road on the Egerton though Alexandra Road had already been Estate and focused on Kensington Road, Ryebank extended to the new railway line from Manchester Road and Beaumont Road. Chorltonville, as an Central Station. early garden city style development represents By the 1950s Chorlton is solidly enmeshed further early twentieth-century urban develop- in Manchester’s urban sprawl, separated from ment, opening in 1911. 1930s and later council the further outward expansion of Wythenshawe, house building southwest of Barlow Moor Road Sale and Northenden/Gatley by the flood-plain filled in the main remaining area of undevel- ‘Green Belt’ of the River Mersey. Whalley Range oped land and served to link Chorlton to West and Stretford have extended the continuous Didsbury. Population census figures reflect the age urban area southwards into the former Chorlton of buildings map. In the decade following 1861 township and to the east the Withington-Burnage- the population doubled for the first time and then Didsbury suburbs have expanded towards the continued to double for most succeeding decades Mersey bridging points. A few pockets of open until 1921. The largest increase of 177%, from 9,026 un-built land survive in Whalley Range and in 1901 to 24,977 in 1911, ties in with a change especially between Princess Road and Mauldeth in emphasis from building larger semi-detached Road, where Hough End fields on the former first houses to the development of terraces of working- aerodrome of Manchester still remained unde- class housing.