I also went up to the Little Bispham station further up the line. Also designed by J C Robinson and the Blackpool Corporation to modernise the tram network, it was constructed slightly later than Bispham station, erected in 1935.
This tram station provided shelter in the front and side seating areas, and also public toilets which are still in use and seem to be looked after well by the Council (although I did not go inside to check!).
The front seating area is worn down like the Bispham tram station, with empty, rotting window frames and damaged features. Similar to the larger Bispham station, the front of the building has classical ornate features. The building is constructed from brick, with what I presume to be a ceramic tile edging on the door and window frames. It is a jolly looking example of architecture, I find the form, colour and details quite majestic, marooned on a barren coastal strip of land. I really do hope it can be taken care of, so there is not more damage to its structure.
On a very rainy day, I went to visit the Bispham tram station, built in 1932 and designed by J.C Robinson and the Blackpool Corporation. He also later designed the Little Bispham Tram station further up the line which opened in 1935. Within Blackpool, predominantly constructed of Edwardian and Victorian architecture, the two structures, slightly different in their architectural approach were an attempt to modernise the network up to the area of Bispham which is populated by suburban inter war housing.
Bispham Tram Station is the largest of the two, and despite referring to the curved aspect of moderne architecture, its façade presents itself with two columns and repeated urns, creating an odd fusion of modernist and classical architecture. Dr Matthew Whitfield, from English Heritage writes that is was a common approach of early modernism to combine earlier architectural features with a modernist form in hisfeature for the Twentieth Century Society. The Blackpool tram stations were featured in November 2012 on the C20 website as building of the month.
Bispham Tram Station had a ticket hall internally, as well as providing shelter for passengers and promenaders. It is still used as a tram stop, and has a new addition on the left of the building with recent signage of the tram stops name.
The exterior of the building, particularly the rear which faces the sea is in poor condition, and windows and doors have been boarded up. It would be interesting to access the interior, which you can see at various intervals where the openings have been broken into. It is a shame the building cannot be maintained to a better standard.
The tram stop is separated from the tram line by a very popular feature in Blackpool, concrete fences. There is also an addition of a pseudo moderne toilet block on the right of the tram station, a style of toilet repeated along the sea front. Across the road, a 1930s apartment building sits proudly, and asks for a return visit for more inspection!
A few weeks past, I traveled over to Fleetwood to find the Fleetwood Radar Station, built in 1961-2, which is now a listed building. It was my first time to Fleetwood, at the top of the peninsula, and was very taken with this little town, which has been powered by fishing and tourism in the past. It is a short ride on the tram from Blackpool North, and the Radar station, is now managed by Nautical Studies department at Blackpool and the Fylde College.
The unusual and curious building was designed by architects Roger Booth and Eric Morris Hart at Lancashire County Council. Constructed on pillars above the sand in reinforced concrete with a flat roof, the oval building was built for training the coastal craft in radar technology. It has intriguing features such as a triangular porthole window with rounded corners, and an off white and brown paint work colour scheme.
The building was listed in 2003, and was given a Civic Trust commendation in 1965, described as ‘a modest yet dramatic little building’.
You can reach the building easily, as the Fleetwood tram (end of the line) stops on the Fleetwood esplanade, and it sits next to the Fleetwood Coastguard station, Burton’s Lighthouse (1840) and the North Euston Hotel (1840).
(This post is a re-post from Looking Back|Moving Forward blog)
