During a busy weekday afternoon Beth Abbit chatted to commuters, locals and tourists on Piccadilly Approach.
Station Approach(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
A group of ladies pose with a statue of blind soldiers outside Piccadilly Station.
Police officers laugh and chat as they monitor the throng leaving the transport hub.
A man in what looks like a prison-issue grey tracksuit hauls two large transparent sacks over his shoulder and asks a stranger if he can use his phone.
Office workers sip from paper coffee cups and munch on meal deal sandwiches on the go as they weave and zip past one another.
This is Piccadilly Approach on a busy weekday. The gateway to the city centre, it’s a place where commuters, locals and tourists converge.
Nathan Dale, and his dog, Rolo(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
Being honest, it’s not much to look at, but for Big Issue seller Nathan Dale, it’s been a godsend.
He’s been clean for four years but admits that wouldn’t be the case if he’d stuck around Piccadilly Gardens and Market Street.
“Piccadilly Gardens needs condemning,” he says. “They should brick it off and build over it.
“I’m four years clean so I stay on the edges of town. I come here from 11am – 6pm every single day.”
Nathan, 29, cheerfully tells me that his spot outside the station doors is the best pitch he’s ever had.
“It took me four years to get it,” he says. “I love it because it’s away from Piccadilly Gardens.
“It’s very hard graft but if you stick to it, it pays off.”
He tells me he has a card machine so people in a post-cash, post-pandemic world can actually pay him for the magazine.
“I was turning away 30 – 40 people a week because I didn’t have a card reader.
“There’s no begging around here. If they do, they get kicked out.”
At Nathan’s feet stands his dog Rolo, a standard American bulldog who is regularly mistaken for a banned XL Bully.
Rolo is wearing a black muzzle that frankly likens him to the Batman villain Bane. But his owner insists he’s a big softie, despite his ferocious appearance.
And when Nathan’s friend wafts a sausage roll near his face to get him to pose for our photographer Kenny, Rolo wags his tail and smiles.
“I get recognised here because of the dog,” Nathan says. “Someone actually filmed us and put us on TikTok. He’s not a Bully, he just matches that criteria.
“I want to show people that not all Big Issue sellers are the same and not all bulldog breeds are the same. There are some out here trying to make a living.”
As we walk down the incline, we notice three large, orange plastic barriers cordoning off a single broken flagstone.
(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
It seems like overkill given there are several others broken nearby that sit without such grand guarding. A man in a suit weaves past it tutting.
Just then, our photographer Kenny bumps into an old friend. As they catch up I ask James Shenton his thoughts on this part of town.
He stands with his hands in his pockets, squints through his glasses and gazes down the incline towards Piccadilly Gardens.
“You walk down here and get closer and closer to the worst public space in Europe,” he says with conviction.
“When you exit any city station it’s your first impression. I think Victoria station probably gives the best impression.
“To be honest, I actively avoid town. I like a nice pub. I don’t want the crowds and £7.50 pints.
“Manchester is full of beautiful buildings like the cathedral. But this looks 1970s and s***.”
James Shenton(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
As we part ways with James and his pals, a man approaches and hands me a little card with a message about Jesus on one side and the words: “Cheers mate” on the other. It wasn’t a quote I’d known to attribute to Christ, but I’ll take his word for it.
I tell Kenny I’m keen to speak to a tourist. Someone who can see the city with fresh eyes.
He points to a man hauling a large backpack with the flight tickets still attached.
Jim has just come off the train from the airport and has dropped into the city centre for a look around.
He is in England from Cork visiting his sister and will stay in Manchester for a night before heading to Leeds.
“It’s pretty. I like the walkway,” he says with real positivity. “First look – it’s nice.”
Holding a white Magnum ice cream and peering out from behind a rucksack mounted on his front, Jim says he likes the look of the buildings and the ‘wave’ of the station approach building.
I tell him there are some locals who think this is not a particularly attractive space.
Jim, on holiday in the UK, from Cork, Ireland(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
Jim points to the dome of the London Road Fire Station – a building which has sat unused since the 90s – and asks “What’s that?”.
“I really like that. And the wave of this building. I like the architecture.
“People are really friendly here and it looks clean.
“Although people are a bit pale – it’s summer, where’s the sun?” he jokes.
I file Jim in the section of my brain marked ‘perpetually positive individuals’ and thank him for his time.
As we sweep down past Piccadilly Tap we see people outside sipping IPAs and stouts.
By Moose coffee, they drink iced lattes and flat whites.
In recent years there has been a clear attempt to bring cafe culture to Station Approach.
Piccadilly Station Approach(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
Outdoor seating is a hangover from the pandemic that both traders and customers have embraced.
Susan and her daughter are all for it. She’s a New Islington native and remembers the days when she could roller skate over from her house to the city centre.
“I used to play here on my roller skates. It’s still got a sense of community I think.
“This part is better than it was. It’s clear and there’s less Spice around.
“On the Approach you didn’t have this much choice before. I think it’s nice. It feels more relaxed. Even if you’ve been on a long journey you can get a coffee.”
They move on and so do we.
It’s July, but you wouldn’t know it from the steel skies and chill in the air.
Things get busier as we walk towards Piccadilly Gardens(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
We decide to move down the Approach toward Ducie Street and on towards Piccadilly Gardens. This is where things get busier, angrier, edgier.
As they bottleneck at crossings, most pedestrians seem in a rush. Many stare down at their phones. Some shout into them.
Just one elderly woman, pushing a shopping cart, takes her time. Though it’s possible she has no other choice.
A group of French children chatter and laugh as they walk together arm-in-arm.
An agitated lad dressed in a black tracksuit holds his phone aloft and shouts instructions into it while marching past a group with wheelie suitcases.
At the foot of Lever Street stands a derelict plot with scaffolding covered in fake redbrick, with barbed wire and black hoarding separating it from the street.
This was, for many years, the stage for those much-loved city centre performers The Piccadilly Rats.
As we reach Newton Street, closer and closer to the Gardens, I start chatting to taxi driver Paul Campbell.
He’s been waiting for a fare for at least 90 minutes – a side effect, he says, of Uber and changing habits.
Business was good during the Oasis gigs but day-to-day, trade is slow.
“This is a good rank but only four cabs are allowed on at a time,” he says.
Paul Campbell, who immediately asked me if I was a ‘Red’ or a ‘Blue'(Image: Kenny Brown | Manchester Evening News)
“I think a lot of tourists are getting put off coming here because the council are employing these idiots to fine people dropping litter. It’s happening all the time.”
He also claims people are tripping up ‘left, right and centre’ because of broken paving slabs.
“All walks of life are here. I love working in the city because of that but I want to get away from it after work. Some of the things you see, especially at night.”
Like what?
“Like trouble. Drunks. And that puts the tourists off.
“But it’s a crackin’ city.”
A Manchester Council spokesperson said: “Manchester people expect us to combat litter and we make absolutely no apology for doing so.
“The idea that cracking down on litterbugs has any downside is absolute rubbish. And, the millions of tourists who have made Manchester the most visited city in the UK outside London and Edinburgh would agree.”