If you read my posts here or on Facebook regularly you will certainly be aware that 2017 is Hull’s year as UK City of Culture. And that as my personal contribution to the year that I’ve been posting another picture every day to my newest web site, Hull Photos, also known as ‘Still Occupied – A View of Hull‘, the title of a show I had in the city in 1983 in which around 148 of the pictures appeared.
Half Tide Basin and entrance locks, Victoria Dock, 1982
So far I’ve added 406 pictures to the site, rather more than the days of the year so far, as I put pm quite a few pictures before the start of 2017. But every day, usually more or less straight after breakfast, I sit down at my computer, write the code (I have to alter 4 files) and then FTP the day’s new image into place. It’s become a daily ritual, sometimes something of a challenge, especially when I’m away from home, but a little bit of structure I’m sure I will miss when we get to 2018. The latest picture is always shown on this page, as well as on its final resting place in the site, but it’s best to follow the year on Facebook as I usually post some text about it there – and you can comment.
Half Tide Basin form the entrance locks, Victoria Dock, 2017
But of course I had to visit Hull during this special year, and although I’d hoped to find time to go several times, so far I’ve only managed 5 days in February. We had an eventful journey to Hull, parts of which I’m probably not allowed to tell you much about, which involved me traveling alone from Kings Cross to Hull with an empty reserved seat next to me, with my wife taking a later train which was diverted via Selby while the train I was on was kept standing at Kirk Sandall while several rail staff on board argued with a young man who had run across the track to board the service and appeared not to have a ticket. Finally we moved on to Hatfield & Stainforth where a police officer was waiting on the platform, and, over an hour late we finally arrived at Hull, around 20 minutes after Linda got there.
We’d sold Linda’s parental home to pay for her mother’s upkeep in an old people’s home back around 2000, and our old friend with a stately home in the north of the city we were always welcome at died a few years ago, so this year we were staying in digs in the Victoria Dock estate, comfortable enough and only a very short walk from the Old Town thanks to the recent Scale Lane footbridge. We got there, dumped our cases and went out for a walk.
I’d not been to Victoria Dock for over 25 years and it was something of a shock to se what had been a largely open and derelict area turned into a suburban estate, if one with some reminders of its previous life, with the dock entrance and Half Tide Basin retained as a feature.
And while the old Hull had a number of piers, it now has a Promendade, and it was one we had virtually to ourselves on a glorious dramatic winter afternoon.
Siemens, whose ‘blade’ was then dominating Queen Victoria Square in the city cwntre have taken over Alexandra Dock, providing welcome employment, and I suppose the loss of the public footpath on the edge of the Humber there is a small price to pay, but it was a disappointment to find our path blocked there, with a long diversion. Instead we turned back towards the city centre. past The Deep and across the footbridge there to the Minerva for a pub meal.
More pictures: Victoria Dock Promenade
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My London Diary : Buildings of London : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage
All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.
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