At the time, I think we saw them as a means to an end, rather than anything of intrinsic value. The third rail electric 3-car multiple units usually ran as 6-car trains on the New Brighton, West Kirby and Rock Ferry links to Liverpool Central. We were actually very fortunate to have a convenient and regular service to connect us to the stations where we considered that our journeys really began – Hamilton Square for Birkenhead Woodside, James Street for Liverpool Exchange and Liverpool Central for High Level and Lime Street.
Much has altered since then, of course, including the
creation of the Liverpool loop, extensions of the electrified lines on the
Wirral and now another change in rolling stock. The Class 503s of our youth
were replaced by class 507 and 508, and currently by Class 707s.
John Dyer’s 3 photographs are from early in 1962 and show our ‘Leccies in various very familiar settings for us – the sandstone cutting outside New Brighton station as the line makes use of the raised red sandstone cliffs known as the Red Noses and where we were introduced to off-road cycling amongst the gorse, the approach to Grove Road station and by then through the sandhills with Harrison Park on one side and the “Dips” on the seaward side - both venues for park football, and the triangle of lines at Seacombe Junction, with Wallasey Technical Grammar School in the background and Wallacre Park in front of it, where park football would soon afterwards become “proper 11-a-side stuff” for us Old Wallaseyans.
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