bradford

Bradford – a tale of two stations

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A sign outside Bradford Interchange saying 'trains this way'

One of the things often said about Bradford is this:

Bradford has two train stations – but you have to change at Leeds to go anywhere!

While that’s not strictly true, as Bradford does have regular direct services to York, Manchester, Preston, and, from later this month, London, to go to many places outside the north of England it’s necessary to change at Leeds or Manchester. Bradford may have two stations, but both are quite small and only serve regional trains and commuter services – apart from the aforementioned London service starting in 3 weeks time, there are no inter-city services.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

First stations

Bradford’s first station was opened in 1846 by the Leeds and Bradford Railway Company, and was a line from Leeds Wellington Street (now Leeds City station) via the Aire Valley and Shipley. Until then, Bradford’s closest station was Brighouse, which was then known as ‘Brighouse for Bradford’, opened in 1840. The station was located off Kirkgate, to the north of the city centre.

In 1850, the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway built another station, known as Bradford Exchange, to the south of the city centre off Hall Ings.

In 1853, the rapidly-expanding Midland Railway took over the Leeds and Bradford Railway, and the first Bradford station was re-built.

Yet another station, Bradford Adolphus Street, was added in 1854, by the Leeds, Bradford and Halifax Junction Railway. This station was short-lived; it was the furthest from the city centre and closed to passengers in 1867; services were diverted to Bradford Exchange. It remained as a goods station until the 1960s, when it was closed, and was demolished in the 1980s when the A650 Wakefield Road was widened.

Rebuilding

With Bradford Exchange taking on Bradford Adolphus Street’s passengers as well, it became necessary to expand the station in the 1880s and a new 10-platform station was built on the same site. Operationally the station acted as two separate stations; part for the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway and the other for the Great Northern Railway, with separate booking offices.

Mirroring the trend, the Midland Railway’s Bradford station was rebuilt in the 1890s with 6 platforms, and this included the building of a goods station and a hotel, which survives today as the Midland Hotel. From around this time, the station was known as ‘Bradford Market Street’ to differentiate it from the Exchange station. Bradford now had 2 large stations, with 16 platforms between the two.

In the 1900s Midland Railway had completed its Midland Main Line between London and Leeds, and the Settle-Carlisle Line between Leeds and Carlisle, however, it didn’t own the tracks to Leeds and trains were required to reverse. It therefore had an ambitious plan for a new line via its Bradford Market Street station, involving a long tunnel through the city. Trains would therefore be able to operate directly from London to Scotland, via Bradford.

Unfortunately, this never happened; the first world war broke out and this caused the end of the age of prosperity for the railways. In 1923, the multitude of small railway companies were forcibly grouped into four large companies; after the second world war became nationalisation and the creation of the British Railways Board. Around 1924 ‘Bradford Market Street’ became ‘Bradford Forster Square’.

Beeching

The Beeching Cuts of the 1960s hit Bradford quite hard. Many local services were cut, and the Wharfedale Line to Ilkley was proposed for closure. Thankfully, it was saved through local council subsidies. The cuts meant that by 1973 Bradford Exchange was too big; there were not enough services to justify having 10 platforms. A new station was built further away from the city centre, near Bridge Street, with just 4 platforms; this is the station which survives today. In 1983, a bus station was opened next to the railway station and it was renamed ‘Bradford Interchange’ to reflect its status as a multi-modal transport interchange.

In the early 1990s, Metro, West Yorkshire’s public transport executive, decided to fund the electrification of the Airedale and Wharfedale lines to promote passenger growth. In doing so, it was decided to close the existing station at Forster Square, which was also now too big for the small number of services still running and had become very run-down, and construct a new station taking over the ends of the platforms on the city centre side of the station.

Present day

Which brings us to the present day. Unlike 100 years ago, when Bradford had two large stations and direct trains all over the country, we now have two small stations with 3 and 4 platforms respectively. Had the Midland Railway’s grand plans gone ahead, Bradford would have been a key destination on the Midland Main Line, instead of Leeds. I have no doubt that the history of the twin Yorkshire cities would have been very different had that line been built.

But why does Bradford still have 2 stations? In other cities like Leeds, Sheffield and Birmingham, rationalisation in the 1960s saw smaller stations closed and routes combined to create large central stations. If you look at a map of Bradford, you’ll even see that the two stations roughly align with each other. Furthermore, there’s presently not a lot of buildings in between them, due to most of the land having been cleared for the mothballed Westfield shopping centre. Couldn’t they be connected up?

The plan has been mooted many times over the years, however, it’s not that simple. First of all, although the stations are on the same alignment, there is a considerable altitude difference; Bradford Interchange is several metres higher up than Bradford Forster Square which is at the very bottom of Bradforddale (the valley that links Bradford with the Aire Valley). Any railway line would have to be carried by bridge across the town, and with quite steep gradients. As well as Westfield, there are other building such as the new Magistrate’s Court which are planned for the land where the tracks would go. And despite being talked about for years, nobody has come up with any detailed designs, nor the money for such a line. And in any case, Bradford is not a strategic place on the railway network – all of the lines that serve it are purely regional or for local commuters. If it was to be built, it would cost a lot of money which probably wouldn’t provide much benefit, considering that Bradford is well away from the main lines. Its proximity to Leeds doesn’t help, either.

While train services to Bradford have improved somewhat over the past 20 years, I don’t expect to see any big plans for Bradford like we saw 100 years ago. I guess we’ll still be changing at Leeds for years to come.

Bradford – things to see and do as a tourist

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This post is a retort to the news that Bradford has been named as Britain’s worst tourist city in a poll by Travelodge, whose ‘Bradford’ hotel is actually closer to New Pudsey.

Having lived in Bradford for over 7 years I wholeheartedly disagree that Bradford is ‘dangerous, ugly and boring’ as the survey suggests. It’s no less dangerous than any other major UK city and while Bradford has its fair share of 1960s monstrosities in architecture, there are some fine examples of stone-built Victorian buildings which have been faithfully restored and look rather splendid, all over the city.

As for boring, there are plenty of attractions for tourists to visit:

1. In the city centre:

  • National Media Museum – this is the UK’s most visited museum outside of London, and has a wide range of galleries focussing on film, photography, television, radio and new media such as the internet. Its latest addition is an arcade games gallery, where you can play a range of 1980s arcade machines. It’s also home to Yorkshire’s only Imax cinema. Best of all, it’s free to go in (bar the cinemas and some special exhibitions). It was influential in Bradford’s successful bid to become the world’s first UNESCO City of Film, which launches this weekend.
  • Peace Museum – one of Bradford’s lesser-known gems, this has a fantastic collection of items and records. It’s open on Wednesday and Fridays, and for pre-booked groups.
  • Bradford Sculpture Trail – around the turn of the millennium, a series of sculptures were commissioned across the city. This trial takes you around 27 different sculptures and statues, including those of JB Priestley, the famous Bradford-born author.
  • Curry houses – Bradford has a huge range of curry houses across the city and any visit isn’t complete without visiting at least one. There’s the world famous Mumtaz, the student favourite Omar’s, Markaz on Centenary Square and many more. What’s more is that they’re all very affordable.
  • Bradford Cathedral – being one of Britain’s newer cities (the Royal Charter was granted in 1897) the cathedral is quite small compared to the likes of York, Lancaster and Lincoln, however, it’s still an old building with parts dating from the 15th century. It holds regular events and sits in an area of Bradford known as ‘Little Germany’, full of well-preserved and renovated Victorian buildings.
  • Alhambra Theatre – one of several venues in Bradford (there’s also St George’s Hall, Bradford Playhouse and the Theatre in the Mill), the interior of this theatre has been thoroughly restored and looks magnificent. It hosts many major shows throughout the year.
  • The Wool Exchange – once the centre of Bradford’s wool trade, this fantastic piece of 19th century architecture has been restored and now hosts probably the nicest-looking branch of Waterstones in the country. There’s also a Starbucks on the mezzanine level.
  • Bradford 1 Gallery and the Impressions Gallery – these two new art galleries are in Centenary Square and host a number of exhibitions.

2: In the suburbs

  • Bradford Industrial Museum – located in late 19th century mill, this working museum has various examples of mill machinery, as well as a horse-drawn tram, worker’s houses and a transport exhibition. Entry is free and it’s open 7 days a week.
  • Lister Park – open to the public since 1870, this large park includes a boating lake, café, adventure playground, gardens and is also home to the Cartwright Hall art gallery which has recently been host to an exhibition of work by David Hockney, who originally came from the Bradford area. It was named Britain’s Best Park in 2006.
  • Peel Park – across the valley from Lister Park, this opened in 1850 and now plays host to the annual Bradford Mela which is one of the biggest festivals of British Asian culture in the UK.
  • Undercliffe Cemetery – Bradford was at the heart of the UK wool industry and many of the great and good from Bradford’s past have been buried here with some very elaborate and decorative memorials.
  • Bolling Hall – a mansion house which now houses exhibitions showing the life and times of Bradford families over the past few hundred years. Like many of Bradford’s other museums, entry is free.

3: Further afield:

  • Saltaire – a UNESCO world heritage site, and home to Salt’s Mill, which houses a permanent exhibition of art by David Hockney and a range of specialist shops and restaurants.
  • Keighley & Worth Valley Railway – a working steam railway that takes you through the pretty Worth Valley. Connects with the main line at Keighley station.
  • Haworth – a hillside village with a great range of independent shops and fine public houses.

While I think this list is pretty exhaustive I’m sure there’s bits I’ve missed. But there’s certainly no shortage of things to see and do as a tourist in Bradford and it’s well worth spending a day or two to look around. There’s also the City Park which is under construction and will be open by next summer.

(See also another take on the article and an article in our local newspaper)

Transperience, Bradford’s forgotten transport museum

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A photo of the former auditorium at Transperience

At the weekend I wrote a new Wikipedia article about Transperience.

The Transperience Museum

Transperience was a museum that I was aware of when I was younger, and I remember seeing leaflets about it. But neither I, nor my parents, had never had the chance to visit it during the short time that it was open.

It was essentially an open-air museum of passenger transport. There were some transport simulators, as well as a working one kilometre tram line and a couple of trolleybuses. In addition, there was an auditorium and some workshops were its preserved vehicles were maintained.

The museum was built on the site of Low Moor station, south of Bradford. The station used to be at the junction of the Caldervale Line, between Bradford and Manchester, with the Spen Valley Line which ran through Cleckheaton, Heckmondwike and Liversedge. The station, and the whole Spen Valley Line, were closed in the 1960s, but the Caldervale Line thankfully remains. Otherwise, my regular trips to Blackpool would be far more difficult.

Closure

Despite being right next to junction 2 of the M606 and easy reach of the M62, and costing £11.5 million to build, the park closed in 1997. It had only been open for a little over 2 years. Unfortunately, it couldn’t attract enough visitors to be viable, and was £1 million in the red by the time it was taken over by administrators. The land was mostly sold off to a private developer and is now an industrial estate. The route of the tram line now forms the first part of the Spen Valley Greenway, a footpath and cycle route which follows the route of the Spen Valley Line. Some buildings, like the auditorium remain, but overgrown and derelict.

Interestingly, the site is likely to go full circle. Metro, the public body which manages passenger transport in West Yorkshire, has plans to re-open Low Moor station. Its location close to the M606 means it would make a good parkway station. Plus, it will allow residents of Low Moor and towns in the Spen Valley to catch the train without having to travel into central Bradford or Leeds. It’s likely that the few remaining relics of Transperience will be tarmacked over by the new station’s car park. The station is proposed for 2012, subject to planning permission and funding.

It’s a shame that I never had chance to visit Transperience, as it seemed like an interesting museum that suffered from poor marketing and a lack of focus. Thankfully, museums such as the Crich Tramway Village have succeeded where Transperience failed.

Update (Dec 2016): Work on the new Low Moor railway station is underway, with a likely opening date in 2017. Most of the Transperience infrastructure that remained by 2010 is still there, albeit still abandoned.

The header image for this post is Copyright Humphrey Bolton and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

Father puts pins in son’s tongues because of God

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This was originally a guest post at Stupid Evil Bastard, re-posted here following that site’s demise.

A Nigerian-born father of two boys, living in the UK, felt that since God had his tongue cut off in the Bible, he must inflict similar injuries on his sons. He put pins in their tongues and through their lips, cut their mouths with scalpel blades, and pressing one of the boy’s tongue with sharp pliers until it swelled and bled.

It went to court, and he was found guilty of three counts of child cruelty. He pleaded not guilty; his wife also pleaded not guilty to essentially turning a blind eye to the cruelty. They await sentencing and a verdict on further charges.

Bradford good for transport links?

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According to this article, Bradford is the best British city for business due to its transport links. It’s a little scant on details, but it claims Bradford has good transport links and low levels of congestion.

Now I live in Bradford, and this surprises me. To start with, here’s what is good about transport in Bradford:

  • Roads – Bradford has good links with the M62, via the M606 and the A650/A641, and the bits of the central ring road that have been completed make for a good bypass of the city centre. The signposting is generally good and even at peak times traffic generally keeps moving.
  • Buses – Bradford Interchange is a large, modern bus station with both short and mid-distance bus services and long distance coach services serving a wide variety of destinations, including many airports. It’s also connected to the railway station. Bus services are frequent and reasonably cheap.
  • Trains – Bradford has two railway stations, with trains at least every 15 minutes to Leeds all day and regular local services. A couple of trains run direct to London each day.

But there’s a lot that needs improving.

Roads

The central ring road isn’t finished, and probably never will be. Part of the missing bit requires demolishing listed buildings around the university, or tunnelling underneath it, which would be prohibitively expensive. The missing section therefore uses older roads in the city centre, which makes for a confusing one-way system on roads not designed for the level of traffic they now take.

And while the road connections to the south and to Leeds are adequate, to the north the road quality falls sharply. Anyone who’s ever wanted to drive from Bradford to north Lancashire would testify to this, as you crawl through places like Saltaire and Keighley. Leeds Bradford Airport, for example, is only accessible via a single carriageway A-road, which passes through suburbs and villages on the way. And the outer ring road is mostly a joke – it’s a series of existing roads roughly forming a ring around the city that were designated a number. Most sections are not designed for the amount of traffic they now carry, and so it’s often quicker to use the central ring road rather than try to avoid the city altogether.

Buses

To be honest I don’t have a lot to fault Bradford’s bus services on – compared to other cities they’re pretty good.

Trains

One of the local sayings here is on the lines of ‘Bradford may have 2 railway stations, but you still need to change at Leeds to go anywhere’. Unfortunately this is quite true – the direct service to London is only twice a day, and there are no long distance services, just hourly mid-distance trains which stretch out to York, Manchester, Wakefield, Blackpool and Preston.

To go anywhere else, and you have to change at Leeds or Manchester, and since the trains call at Manchester Victoria and not Piccadilly, you might as well just go via Leeds. Leeds Bradford Airport is one of the few airports in the country that doesn’t have a railway station or concrete plans for one, despite its proximity to the Leeds-Harrogate railway line. Most of the trains which run into Bradford Interchange are at least 15 years old and tend to be handed down from other companies when they get new trains – the only ‘new’ trains running into Bradford are those which serve Ilkley, Skipton and Leeds from Bradford Forster Square.

Bradford’s transport links aren’t bad on the whole, but to call them the best is laughable. There is so much that can be done to improve transport here, especially the railways.

Man sees Allah’s name on a chapatti

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This was originally a guest post at Stupid Evil Bastard, re-posted here following that site’s demise.

It’s not just Christians who find Jesus or the Virgin Mary on pieces of toast – a Muslim man from Bradford in England has found the arabic script for Allah, the Muslim God, on a chapatti.

He showed it to his stunned family and since then neighbours and members of the Muslim community have flocked to view it. All agree that the markings on the food appear to spell out the holy name.

Mr Iqbal said: “It was definitely an unusual event. A lot of religious leaders have come to check it and they have confirmed that it is very clearly the name of Allah in Arabic.

“In every other respect it is just a normal chapatti. This has never happened before. We left it as it is, it has gone a bit hard now but it is still clearly visible.”

Photographic eye

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You may remember the beach party back in June, which I waxed lyrical about for a few days and then nothing. I took around 170 photos over the two days (a total of 130MB) and still haven’t really got around to sorting them.

Anyway, the student union were given copies of my photos (since I was effectively their photographer) and the good news is that three of them have already been used in union propaganda publicity material, in the form of a leaflet given out to prospective students introducing the union and what it does. Surprisingly enough, student unions are somewhat more than a cheap source of alcohol.

You can have a look at scaled-down versions of the originals. Incidentally those were taken quite late in the day when the sun finally came out.

Beach for the stars

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I’m only able to post a few photos today. I have taken rather more (around 70 to be precise) but they’re not on this computer yet – I’ll probably upload a few at the weekend.

Today we had some schoolchildren and the university nursery use the beach, along with Bradford’s bactive campaign, who roped myself and other union members into “combat aerobics”. After that and then having to rake the sand my body is aching all over. Going out and then only having 6 hours sleep last night didn’t exactly help either…

On the plus side, I got to meet Bradford’s Lord Mayor, who’s actually a really nice guy. And despite all the pain, I did have a thoroughly enjoyable day – roll on Friday!

Settled in

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Here I am, settled at University with my own (incredibly slow) internet connection. I would have posted here on Wednesday, but for some reason I decided to plug the modem cable into the ethernet socket (the fact it fitted is slightly worrying). I only discovered this on Friday morning as I was going out to buy a new modem cable.

So, what have I been doing? Going out a lot, getting slightly tipsy and watching my next door neighbour get hypnotised by a random Canadian bloke. And catching up on all of the emails I’ve missed.

I was hoping to write some entries to put in here but I only really got the first entry done, so here it is:

Got up and packed final stuff (music, razor etc.) into the car almost filling it (we had to abandon the stereo box and just take the parts in plastic bags – actually I think we took more stuff then we do when we go on holiday, but then usually cooking utensils are provided and we don’t need to take much food. Or pillows.

We set off at about 10:30am, and arrived at the hall just under an hour later. Me and my mum (unintentionally) left Dad with the car while we jetted off to the main building to collect my keys – all 4 of them, plus an access swipe card. The room is on the fifth floor – the building is 10 floors high I think. 5th isn’t bad, I guess, and there are 2 good lifts, plus two staircases.

The room itself is much larger than I expected – you could easily swing a cat in it, if you really wanted to. There’s a good sized desk, and adequate storage, though I wish the chest of draws were larger – I ended up hanging up some of my jumpers on coat hangers. Which reminds me – next time I’m home (October if all goes to plan) I’ll bring some more back… There’s also a washbasin in the room, which is handy – the showers are separate, and are okay. The toilets do leave something to be desired though – ah well, you can’t have everything.

The kitchen is better than I was expecting too – looks like it has been recently refurbished, and although there’s only one cooker there seems to be adequate storage space (although some stuff is staying in my room since I don’t want it getting nicked). The view is also good – it was built in the 1960′s so the windows are huge (and it’s okay to leave them open as I don’t think people are going to climb in and take stuff) – I get a nice view across to the centre of Bradford.

Although I seem to be on a mostly male floor (damn!) the guys that I’ve met so far all seem quite cool, especially the guy next to me (hi Anthony!). For dinner we went down to a local curry restaurant (oh come on, it’s Bradford for gawd’s sake!) called ‘Posh Spice’ (and yes it was quite posh, but cheap too) and got a takeaway which we ate back at the kitchen (there’s a dining area too).

From what I gather, I’m the only one out of my peer group at Bradford – a few of my friends have gone to Manchester, but most are spread around the country – so I’ll obviously have to make some new friends. Which isn’t too bad because everyone seems quite friendly – although I haven’t spent much time in the union bar I did go to play pool (I lost, btw). But hey, there’s a whole week to get stuff done.

The area is a little bizarre – whereas in York you hardly ever see people of other ethnic groups (bar the odd Japanese tourist), here whites are an ethnic minority. The bulk of people are of Asian or West Indian origin – usually the only white people are students. It’s not that I have a problem with that, it’s just… strange. Well, for me at least. They all seem friendly though, and I haven’t seen any threatening gangs of youths.

The hall is a 5-10 minute walk from the main campus where everything happens, which is good since it’ll give me some exercise and won’t be as noisy (in theory).

Overall? Yeah, I like it. I was certainly expecting much worse. Now if I could just get internet access….

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