ONE OF MANCHESTER's most controversial postwar schemes is the £250,000 plan to change the layout of the Piccadilly area. It was on view to members of the city council in February 1953 after being under consideration for more than two years. The plan involves recarpeting of roads in the Piccadilly area, new traffic islands, realignment of pavements, including the 'bulges' at the Newton St corner, and the moving the present bus station to a site nearby.

On Tuesday April 21 1953, the statue 'Adrift' was moved to the Portland-street end to make way for a £1500 fountain given by a city store as a permanent Coronation memorial.

On May 27, watched by thousands of people, the Lord Mayor of Manchester Abraham Moss opened the Coronation fountain. It was paid for and donated by Henry's Stores, whose Managing Director Israel Cohen was present at the ceremony. In Piccadilly Gardens and all over Manchester there are decorations and floral displays to mark the Coronation of HM Queen Elizabeth.

EWM says: Controversial redevelopment of Piccadilly continues in our own era, with the removal of the Coronation fountain, Cassidy statue and Wellington Statue, to make way for 'environmental improvements' including a new office block. Is the Piccadilly of 2004 more or less attractive than the Piccadilly of fifty years before? To find out, view some of the remarkable archive images of Piccadilly Gardens to be found at the Local Studies Unit at Manchester Central Library. You'll also find many pictures of the Coronation, which I've referred to only in passing here, as it is well-covered in other media.

A FASCINATING EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT of Manchester in 1953 is provided in a letter from Felicity Fox of 18 Heaton Rd Withington Manchester, printed in the July 20th edition of the Manchester Evening News.

Originally from the Kentish Weald, she was warned by her neighbours against going to Manchester. They said it was the blackest and ugliest of all England's cities, lacking in all artistic and architectural beauty, whose people were quite 'gormless' and only interested in the production of cotton.

"It is true that Manchester is black!" she continues, "a smoke-scarred city of grimed buildings. But Manchester is the lustiest, gayest and most friendly city I've ever lived in. Culture and the arts are not lacking either. Attractions include the City Art Gallery, the Whitworth Galleries, John Rylands Library, Opera House, imposing theatres, all well patronised, and cinemas, ice rinks, dance halls, speedway, dog tracks, and swimming-pools. In fine weather the Manchester man can take his sweet heart or wife and children to Buxton, Alderley Edge or over to Blackpool or Southport.

"The shops in Manchester are well stocked and reasonably priced. Jewellers' windows sparkle. Food stores look clean and are clean. Pastry shops in Manchester are more numerous than cafes and have Tharle bread, pastries, parkins and fancies, all of a high standard of freshness and wholesomeness. Cleaning and repair shops are proud of their speed. In Manchester a man can have his suit cleaned in 24 hours and his shoes repaired in three days. The shop assistants enjoy serving their customers, a welcome change from the dreadful 'I couldn't care less' attitude of London and the south."

EWM says: A glowing appraisal from a southerner in Manchester, but can the same be said of Manchester in 2004?

DISASTER STRUCK on the morning of Saturday August the 15th 1953 when two trains crashed on the Smedley Road viaduct, Collyhurst. The 7 20 am Bury-to-Manchester electric train plunged 90 ft over the viaduct into the River Irk after it hit the 7 36 steam train out of Manchester Victoria. The engine of the steam train overturned. It is believed the accident would not have happened if the electric train had been running five seconds later.

Firemen police ambulance workers and railwaymen described the scene as being 'like a battlefield'. The electric-train driver Mr Albert Hardman, of Bury, died in the crash. The ex-Mayor of Bury was due to retire next year after nearly 50 years railway service. The drivers of the steam train are believed to have jumped clear. A 20 ft gap was torn in the viaduct wall when the electric coach smashed through it and plunged 90 feet into the River Irk below.

A Catholic priest, Father Reynolds, who was staying at St Malachy's Church Collyhurst was one of the first to arrive at the scene and crawled among the wreckage helping the injured and dying. Doctors and nurses from Ancoats, Crumpsall and the Jewish hospitals were called to the scene. Every available vehicle from the Manchester Ambulance Brigade was sent there, as well as 7 ambulances and two cars from Salford, three from Stockport and two from Stretford.

EWM says: Railway accidents are comparatively rare these days, but almost exactly 50 years after the Irk Valley train disaster, a minibus taking holiday makers from the Britannia Hotel West Didsbury to Manchester Airport crashed on the M56 motorway, killing 7 people. The accident happened at around 5.40 am on Thursday 10 July 2003. Like many of the Irk Valley victims, the minibus passengers were about to go on holiday. Emergency services described the scene of the accident as 'carnage'. Will we ever live in a world where road, rail and air accidents are a thing of the past?

A CHASE ENDED at the junction of Grosvenor St and Downing Street after police tried to stop a shooting brake with three prisoners from Strangeways who had escaped two weeks earlier. Prisoner Stanley Davis Richardson, 32, tried to run away but police caught him. Prisoners Thomas Lancaster and Albert Charles O'Brey were found inside unconscious. All three escaped from Strangeways by climbing over a temporary section of prison wall. Skid marks were left on the pedestrian crossing at Grosvenor Street after the shooting brake swerved and crashed.

EWM says: Following prison riots and rooftop protests in 1989, alterations and improvements to the prison were carried out, and it is now virtually impossible to escape from HMP Manchester, alias Strangeways.