Forums Forums Wirral History : Chasing the Past History Information Request Woodchurch Road, before the M53

Great pic! Sometimes this site feels like a time machine!

Good one Marty. It's spot on with the Memory Dept. The original Woodchurch road by-passing the roundabout. Also shows one of the mercury vapour streetlights.

Woodchurch Road seemed a little quieter then ??

Thanks for that.

Thanks very much, marty99fred for finding and posting this excellent photo! The resourcefulness of this site continues to amaze me.

I have an A4 photo frame here which contains several photos of Wirral stacked up behind each other, and every now and again I bring another one out to the front. For the last few months it has contained a photo of round bales of hay in a field near Chapel House Lane, Puddington which I took myself, but seriously I want to put this Woodchurch Road photo in there next! It's certainly an interesting talking point.

As previously mentioned, I'm astonished and of course very glad that someone did actually go out that day long ago and bother to photograph this stretch of road.

Interesting points about the original plans for the Woodchurch estate spanning both sides of the road. I never knew that. It doesn't surprise me though, but when walking down Landican Lane not too long ago as one chap on horseback said "Good Afternoon" to me, it really brought home to me the fact that Woodchurch Road itself at that point completely deliniates a truly rural setting from a suburban one. I'd often felt privileged that we can visit Landican village and there is not a housing estate there. Nice walk down to Little Storeton village too. I do wonder what sort of pressures are on the Landican area for future housing projects. I'm not aware of any, but I have always felt that Landican village is somehow lucky to survive being surrounded (roughly speaking) by Prenton, Woodchurch and Thingwall.

Thanks again for the photo. Seriously, I'm made up with that, cheers!

I'll see if I can get hold of some copies of the early Woodchurch Estate plans and post them, as it's fascinating to compare them with what was eventually built after the War.

Thanks very much for any possible further images, indeed this is very interesting to me.

I've just been studying the above photo further. As Pinzgauer mentioned, the even older Woodchurch Road can be seen bypassing the roundabout and matches exactly the old OS map previously posted here by Snooze. Great to see the original "country lane" that has now become a four-lane highway.

The enbankment and part of the bridge of the Borderlands railway line can also be seen.

Looking at the shadow cast by the lampost suggests to me that the photograph may have been taken around mid-morning I think, but certainly before lunchtime. I only notice things like this because I hike around the area a lot.

You can make any road look quiet even now. Look at this, the A41 from Rock Lane East, Rock Ferry.


I took it a year ago, early on a Sunday morning. Perhaps the Woodchurch Road one was also taken on a Sunday? In any case I do agree the road probably is more busy now than it was then. Cheers!

Here's another interesting thing about the Woodchurch Road photo, the vantage point seems quite high up, as if the photographer had climbed up something, but what exactly, I guess we'll never know.
It's not apparently taken from ground level though, if I didn't know better I'd say it was taken from a bridge, but there was no bridge at that position according to the maps we have.

EDIT: Then of course there is the bicycle in the foreground, the photographer's bicycle, perhaps? I'd love to know the story behind the photo!

EDIT: It's also difficult to tell, but on the right-hand side of the photo, you can just about make out a row of houses. I think they are behind the railway enbankment but not 100% sure. I'm guessing that would be Kenmore Road and apparently Durley Drive did not exist when this photo was taken, although I'm sure someone would correct me if I'm wrong.

Yes Paul, I agree. I think the row of houses visible beyond the railway embankment would be the backs of the houses in Kenmore Road. I lived in Ennerdale Rd. The building with the chimney looks as if it was the old waterworks pumping station in Prenton Dell Road - demolished late '60's (?).

"Somewhere", I've seen a series of elevated photos taken of the start of works on the Woody estate. I'm sure these were taken from the top of either a Crosville or corpy tree lopping bus (open top) as the guardrail is in one of the pics. (Real memory trawling now!) I suspect the roundabout picture was taken at the same time. It's about the right height for the photo to be taken from.

Yes, Landican Village has withstood the onslaught of the developers right enough. Let's hope it stays that way. Ditto Storeton Village.

An isolated pair of cottages (it's actually a semi I think) were still standing in Landican Lane last time I was up there. As youngsters out on long walks, we would knock on the LH door and ask for a glass of water ! The old couple (everyone was old then) would gladly bring out said glass of water, sometimes lemonade and also a biscuit. Try THAT nowadays !

The Home Farm, Landican was owned by a Mr Duncan (?) who was a magistrate. If he saw you on his land, he or one of his flunkies would be after you with a tirade of abuse. Slightly different from the couple mentioned just down the lane.

Previously posted photos of pristine buildings as built, from the 1951 Birkenhead Official Guide.

pinz,you are right with mr duncan, his name is miles duncan,my company has been delivering building materials to him for a few years now,his mother lives in one of the small cottages on the other side of the road

I've hiked quite a bit around Landican. Fortunately, I've never been shouted at yet, but as a (hopefully) responsible adult, I'm very careful to stick strictly to public rights of way and never would deliberately tresspass.

Having said that, there is one footpath starting from a stile on the corner of Barnston Road and Landican Lane which quite honestly it's not obvious which way it goes once you get into the second field. The first time I walked it, I didn't have my OS map on me and I think I did inadvertently stray a bit off it, so I just got straight back onto the main Landican Lane as quickly as possible!

I also tend to only walk the Lane during weekends nowadays. Last year, I was off work one week and I walked it during a morning weekday rush hour. There were that many vans and cars coming down the lane, I did start to wonder where they were all coming from. It's as if the road was being used as some sort of commuter's shortuct. Of a weekend it seems to remain quiet though, with the usual assortment of joggers, cyclists, dog-walkers and the occasional tractor.

Also interesting pont, Pinzgauer about the open top buses. I have to agree with you the height looks exactly right for that on the roundabout photo. i.e. it's considerably higher than a person standing up, but a bit lower than a bridge would be- it is upper deck of a bus height.

I'm glad you mentioned the Prenton chimney, I was about to ask what it was, certainly it no longer exists.

Also, they are nice photos, bri445 - really looks quite idyllic, some sort of utopian paradise - certainly light years away from the social problems of the 80s etc..

Landican, i wonder if they got married.

The photo was probably taken by the Borough Engineers Dept, who at that time would have had access to the tower wagons used for maintaining the overhead tram wires - it was probably taken from the top of one of them. Liverpool City Engineers photographs contain lots of photos taken from similar elevated viewpoints, together with others that actually show the tower wagons in use.

Good point !

Indeed, that's that explained then, thanks for the further info!