Manchester, Great Northern Square

Image: © David Dixon Taken: 1 Mar 2013

A view from Peter Street, across Manchester's Great Northern Square. The Great Northern Warehouse and its environs was historically a transport interchange for the massive volume of goods arriving by rail at Central Station - now Manchester Central - in Manchester. As part of the redevelopment of the area in the late 1990s, buildings at the Peter Street end of Deansgate were cleared to open up the site and create the Great Northern Square. This elegant landscaped public square was Manchester's first purpose-built public square to be created since the Second World War. To the right, is The Great Northern Warehouse, the grade II* listed building (Historic England List entry Number: 1268529 https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1268529 ) which was built above the Manchester and Salford Junction Canal; a dock beneath was constructed to allow goods to be transferred to and from canal barges via shafts and a complex system of haulage using hydraulic power. According to Historic England, the warehouse is a "unique survival of a three-way railway goods exchange station, serving the railway, canal and road networks of the Manchester region”. Once a neglected Victorian landmark, the “Great Northern” has now been converted into a leisure and shopping development with bars, cafes and restaurants set in (http://www.thegreatnorthern.com/ for more information). In contrast to the Victorian warehouse, the Great Northern Tower, at the far end of the square, is a modern development built between 2004 and 2006. This residential tower building which is clad in glass, steel and grey tiles is characterised by its dramatic slope. The 25-storey tower on the corner of Watson and Wilson Streets houses 80 apartments whilst there are a further 177 apartments in the lower component of the building, which starts at 10 storeys high and runs up towards the tower. This lower block runs along Watson Street, directly opposite the Great Northern Warehouse (http://manchesterhistory.net/architecture/2000/greatnorthern.html Manchester History Net).

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