1950s plan for a futuristic Manchester

[John Ashworth]

Revealed: The 1950s plan for a futuristic Manchester of helipads and underground trains

Exclusive by Yakub Qureshi February 23, 2012
Manchester Evening News

Rooftop helipads, moving walkways and an underground railway system – this is how 1950s planners imagined Manchester would look in the future.

Fascinating drawings which reveal how the post-war city would be transformed are revealed in a new exhibition.

Researchers have uncovered blueprints for city-centre helipads which would have allowed commuters to shuttle from Piccadilly Gardens to other cities.

The proposals – first put forward by the council in 1956 – considered a number of potential sites, including the roof of Victoria railway station, but all were eventually rejected as being unviable. Other unrealised plans which feature in the Cube gallery exhibition include the construction of an underground rail system similar to London’s Tube.

The 1976 bid to Whitehall and British Rail bosses, would have seen Piccadilly and Victoria stations connected – with a stop under the town hall and a moving platform connecting Oxford Road station and Piccadilly Gardens. But Manchester lost out to Liverpool and Newcastle, which went on to develop underground networks.

The plans had been all but forgotten until Manchester University researchers Martin Dodge and Richard Brook saved them from obscurity.

Dr Dodge, a geography expert, said the helicopter plans had been taken seriously – with numerous surveys undertaken – until it became clear they would not be able to transport large numbers of passengers. He said: "There was a lot of interest in a UK-wide helicopter network and a real expectation people could commute by flying between Manchester, Birmingham and London. They looked at a number of sites, measured the spaces and drew up plans."

However, not all the proposals were pipedreams.

The Portland Street exhibition, called Infra_Manc, also tells the story of how the Mancunian Way was created.

The dual carriageway, completed in 1967, was a major engineering project – with traffic raised well above existing buildings. But the original plans – conceived in 1945 – instead proposed a ground-level road which would have seen huge swathes of the city demolished.

Maps also shine light on a secret network of tunnels built 200ft under China Town to protect the city’s phone system against a Cold War nuclear attack.

Co-curator Richard Brook, from the Manchester School of Architecture, said the exhibition intended to highlight the ambitious plans for the city.

He said: "Many of the proposals show the planners of the time had great foresight, vision and optimism.

Some of these ideas were actually quite beautiful, but sadly they weren’t to be and by the time of the 1973 oil crisis – when cash and energy were suddenly in short supply – they were abandoned."