Trafford Park Village  On the corner of Village Way
and Second Avenue in Trafford Park this monument stands on a grass
verge behind railings. The name of the road and the monument
refer to the Trafford Park Village of which there are only a few
remnants today. After the Manchester Ship Canal was completed in
1894 an
extensive system of wharves, lined with
warehouses, were created at the Salford end. The area around
these docks became an obvious focus for further industrial
and
commercial development. Factories, mills and warehouses were
built to take advantage of the commercial opportunities offered by the
new port.
The first American company to build a factory was the Westinghouse Electrical Company, founded in 1886 by George Westinghouse. A British subsiduary of the US company, called British Westinghouse Electric Company, built a factory at a place called Water Meeting beside the Bridgewater Canal.  In addition to the factory
Westinghouse built a village for his workers on the American style grid
system of avenues and streets. The community had shops, eating
rooms, a dance hall, schools, a church, and a cinema. The village
can be seen in the map extract below dated 1930.
  
************************ If you turn off Village Way
today you will find that the streets and avenues are still there, as
are
some of the public buildings, but for the most part the houses are
gone. Below is a visual tour of the Trafford Park Village in
January 2010.
 Third Avenue looking south with
the Village Heritage Centre, in the St. Antony's Centre, on the right
and beyond the remaining rows of shops.
 Above: the Third Avenue Shops  Saint Antony's Centre  The War Memorial from the
Metropolitan Vickers Factory in the Village Heritage Centre.
 Across Third Avenue from the St
Antony Centre stands this memorial to Marshall Stevens, who is credited
with being a prime mover in the creation of the Trafford Park
Industrial Estate.
   St Antony's Church on Eleventh
Street. It was built as a temporary structure in 1904 but as you
can see it is still there and it was reclad in green corrugated iron in
1994.
 On the corner of Eleventh
Street and Fifth Avenue stands the presbytery and in the garden between
it and the church is what seems to be a shrine.
  The Village School was built in
1914. Since much of the village was demolished in the 70s and 80s
the school closed and the building was a candidate for
demolition. The building was saved and renovated by Urban Splash
creating a residential complex that was awarded a prestigious RIBA
award in 1996.
 Over the entrance doors at
either end of the building Urban Splash retained the stone "INFANTS"
sign.
  They found an interesting use
for the school signs for "GIRLS" and "BOYS" incorporating them into the
public toilets that can be found between the two terraces of shops.
  This plaque has been attached to
the side of one of the shops.
"This building was formally dedicated to the Cooper family who were family traders in the village from 1966 - 1994 by Mr. Chris Cooper on Tuesday 17th October 1995, following a substantial refurbishment program by Trafford Park Development Corporation."  Above: The former Parish Church of St. Cuthbert's  Above: The Village Inn  This used to be the entrance
into the Westinghouse - later Metro-Vicks -
factory. You can see the spot marked with an arrow on the old
photograph below.
 Below; The Trafford Park Hotel - now closed and up for sale.        Close Window |