Hia Everyone!

Thought Id post this pic I took from M floor in the UMIST Chemistry Faraday tower in 2003, should have taken somemore but I spent 6 months of my final year project looking out onto this bit of road wandering what it was built for?


http://images.fotopic.net/?iid=y7irb0&noresize=1&nostamp=1&quality=70[/QUOTE]


andy

http://www.pathetic.org.uk

The answer may lie here! :)

I walked under that the other day. There was a tramp there who on first worried glance appeared to be doing something disgusting over page 3 of the Sun. But on second inspection he was only sorting out some drugs. Phew.

It's like some sort of floppy impotent hard-shoulder.

Thats just werid.

I saw a wee feature on North West tonight about this, yonks ago.

Apparently the Mancy Way was to be extended. I'm not too sure there was an actual plan for that spur but they built it "just in case".

Either way, the Mancy Way extension never happened and thus, we're left with what is universally known as "The Road To No-where"

It they knocked it down they could build a nice skyscraper in that space.

The Mancunian Way was intended to be the start of a motorway linking Central Manchester with Sheffield. I'm guessing they built roads and slip roads to prepare for the extension. The M67 is the other part of that intended link, but it ended up stopping at Mottram after the plans were scrapped. A lot of the intended route has incomplete slip roads etc, such as at the Denton Roundabout, where there is an incomplete ramp at the end of the M67 which was intended to go over the roundabout towards Central Manchester. I believe that around the late 60s and into the 1970s a lot of demolition went on along the route of the A57 which was to make way for the motorway. Obviously it didn't happen, which might explain why the Mancunian Way is a pretty low standard of motorway- I think it was going to be improved at a later date.

http://www.pathetic.org.uk

The answer may lie here! :)

Oh well it was a strange sight to look down on from the chemistry tower. I used to walk under the that section of the mancunian way every day into the corner of UMIST and underneath the carriageway there is a small plaque saying "Concrete Society Award 1967" ! Or some other year in the 60's, the plaque is made out of conrete too i think - it looked like it was anyway.


andy

It they knocked it down they could build a nice skyscraper in that space.

Absolutely horrible place for a skyscraper.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y57/caw123/P1240029copy.jpg

Absolutely horrible place for a skyscraper.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y57/caw123/P1240029copy.jpg
Knock all that shite down. Clear the area up, put a nice building there and I would see nowt wrong with it.

Knock all that shite down. Clear the area up, put a nice building there and I would see nowt wrong with it.

As I remember it seemed like a bit of a dodgy area, was fine walking in through there in the morning when it was busy but you wouldnt want to walk on your own through there in the dark, there was a few iffy looking subways that looked best avoided too.

They tried to clean it up a bit and put fences around the entrances to the subway parts and bridge posts so no-one could jump out on you! So I guess it must have been rife for muggings.


andy

Toiletduck, do you happen to have any more photos from there?

Toiletduck, do you happen to have any more photos from there?


Hi,

Nope unfortunately it never occured to me to take any more while I had use of the departments only digital camera at the time! I think they were fairly rare then. Its a shame because you got a great view over the city from up there. You do mean from the building, not the bit under the mancunion way?

andy

Put it this way, if the purpose of that sliproad would have been fulfilled, Manc would be a lot more like Birmingham than it is today. From what I understand, this would have carved a dual carriageway right through Chinatown.

The Mancunian Way was intended to be the start of a motorway linking Central Manchester with Sheffield. I'm guessing they built roads and slip roads to prepare for the extension. The M67 is the other part of that intended link, but it ended up stopping at Mottram after the plans were scrapped. A lot of the intended route has incomplete slip roads etc, such as at the Denton Roundabout, where there is an incomplete ramp at the end of the M67 which was intended to go over the roundabout towards Central Manchester. I believe that around the late 60s and into the 1970s a lot of demolition went on along the route of the A57 which was to make way for the motorway. Obviously it didn't happen, which might explain why the Mancunian Way is a pretty low standard of motorway- I think it was going to be improved at a later date. Good post Liam. Accura, this is just a slip road to UMIST and Upper Brook. The plan was to extend the Mancunian way around Ancoats and Trinity Way to girdle the city, but at a greater radius than the Birmingham Inner Ring Road. A slip road is nothing in itself, but it's a fossil remnant of what might have been. IMHO incomplete roads like the M67 have held back Manchester's economic development because of restricted road links to the Midlands and South. It's the M6 or nothing. And then you've got to use the A556. Shameful. If you don't drive you won't fully feel what I mean. But imagine if Preston was accessible only down a dirt track.

There were to be a number of concentric ring roads, the old a-z guides of the late 60s and early 70s show "proposed roads" that would circle the city, the inner one being based on Manc way. Second was to circle the inner suburbs, in south it would have cut across where the Asda junction is in Hulme. The area to the south of Birley fields area (as it was) would have had the road thru it. The outer ring we know as the M60

map shows rough alignment in Hulme / Moss Side area

http://img214.imageshack.us/img214/1514/hulmecomp3ya.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I like the way they've just stuck a big M in the way to cover it up!

Put it this way, if the purpose of that sliproad would have been fulfilled, Manc would be a lot more like Birmingham than it is today. From what I understand, this would have carved a dual carriageway right through Chinatown.
Thank god it never got built then. There's enough cars in Manchester as it is!

I always notice that concrete society award on the bridge as well. 1968?? I'll check next time I walk past. It doesn't seem too dangerous tho, I've walked through there fair bit at night and never had any trouble.

Why would you have any trouble?? It's only students who walk around there anyway.

Move the letter M, clear up the graffiti, plant a few trees and balance a car on/over the edge. Hay presto! Another tourist attraction. :)

Move the letter M, clear up the graffiti, plant a few trees and balance a car on/over the edge. Hay presto! Another tourist attraction. :)
Yeh but you forgot...we insert the letter M into the glass blade of the Beetham tower...
'kinell, sorry i'm sounding like dan here.... :runaway:

Yeh but you forgot...we insert the letter M into the glass blade of the Beetham tower...
'kinell, sorry i'm sounding like dan here.... :runaway:

Sir MP...Are you sure you haven't caught a virus from me... !!! There's plenty of Irwell flu going around at the moment.... :cheers: !!!!

Absolutely horrible place for a skyscraper.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y57/caw123/P1240029copy.jpg

The M stands for "MISTAKE"..........Nice bit of Stainless Steel Cam'era'ouflage though!!!

Just introduced myself to some of you over at the city tower thread.
Hope to be able to contribute a bit.
heres my first bit of 'know-it-all-ism'.
The missing spur was supposed to sweep down and, as other people have said, meet a four lane dual carriageway that would have taken out much of Princess Street and met another one at a large roundabout at the junction with Portland Street.
Anyway in a great bit of non-joined-up thinking the spur was planned at about the same time that Princess Street was made one way - so traffic hurtling off the Mancunian way would have ploughed head on to cars hurtling down Princess Street! When the inner ring road was abandoned the spur was left high and dry.