Trainspotting From The Bathtub: Why Manchester’s Newest Bolthole Is On The Right Track

You don’t have to be a railway buff to enjoy the Station Agent’s House. The restored Georgian gem is a perfect base for exploring the historic Castlefield district

For some, a stately home does it. For others, a converted barn. For me, anything rail-related hits the spot. It’s partly respect for transport and proper jobs. It’s also because I was born and raised 1.2 miles (or a mile and 16 chains in the parlance) south of the world’s first inter-city railway line – the Liverpool and Manchester, which opened on 15 September 1830. Though never a full-blown spotter, I got the transport bug watching 47s and Deltics rumbling along the tracks between St Helens Junction and Newton-le-Willows. Despite the delays and dysfunction that make rail travel so irksome today, I still love trains.

It is then a childish buzz as well as a grown-up, heritage-inspired delight to be spending a couple of nights in the Station Agent’s House, the Landmark Trust’s new property in Castlefield, Manchester. The area, at the southern end of main drag Deansgate, is one of the city’s oldest, though its iron bridges and merchants’ warehouses are now overshadowed by high-rise apartment blocks.