Last weekend around 90 of us had a brilliant afternoon exploring CL2 – the Mayfield, New Islington and Ancoats loop.

We were welcomed by our interim project director Steve Connor at the lovely community garden Station Sanctuary (a collaboration between Network Rail, the National Trust, Sow the City, and Manchester Action on Street Health (MASH) located just outside Piccadilly Station, Jonathan Schofield led us past London Road Fire Station and into Mayfield Park.

Delivered by our partners Landsec together with the rest of the Mayfield Partnership (MCC, TfGM and LCR) the 6.5 acre public park is now thoroughly established and was super busy with families enjoying the sunshine and the six slides in the play space! It was great to hear from Pete Swift all about the daylighting of the Medlock and our hopes to see more of the river revealed in the city centre in the future.

After Mayfield we made our way into New Islington stopping at the Chips building to learn more about the history of the Ashton Canal and the new canal arms Urban Splash created as part of the masterplan for New Islington.

Then in the heart of Cottonfield Park, CyanLines co-founder Tom Bloxham further explained Urban Splash’s role in the creation and delivery of New Islington, its marina and park. We then headed over the bridge with its secret message into Ancoats, where outside Royal Mills Jonathan shared part of his family history – to find out more, you could go on one of his tours visit: https://www.jonathanschofieldtours.com/

Weaving through the streets of Ancoats we paid a quick visit into the ground floor of Beehive Mill (once home to Sankeys night club) and then moved on to the remarkable Ancoats Green. Delivered by Manchester City Council together with Planit (home of CyanLines co-founder Pete Swift) and our partners Civic, Ancoats Green opened last year and is home to a 30,000 sq ft wildflower meadow, some of the granite paving slabs removed from Albert Square (as part of the ongoing refurb project) and a new play area for families.

Finally, we emerged at Cutting Room Square with its busy cafes and bars. From there we split into two groups – one taking the canal from Piccadilly basin while the others stayed on the street and we met up again at Kampus where our walk ended.

At just shy of four miles CL2 visits some of the most new and exciting green and blue spaces in Manchester city centre.

We hope everyone who joined us enjoyed it as much as we did. Look out for our next walk which will be on Sunday 28 June when we’ll be walking CL1 – Victoria Station and NOMA to Queens Park.

Huge thanks to Nathan Whittaker for the fantastic photographs https://www.mancwanderer.com/