ROADS AND ROAD TRANSPORT
Roads
Chester has always lain at the convergence of many
roadways, both national and local, which have both
reflected and reinforced its standing as a regional capital.
It was the focal point of Roman military roads in northwest Britain, (fn. 1) several stretches of which remained in use
in later centuries, often together with river crossings,
notably the Dee Bridge in Chester itself. (fn. 2) East of the city
Roman roads crossed the river Gowy at Stamford and
Trafford, later the site of fords and eventually, by the
13th century, of bridges. (fn. 3) In the Middle Ages political
considerations made Chester an important staging post
for north Wales and Ireland. (fn. 4) The Gough map of c. 1360
depicted the London-Chester-Caernarfon and the Bristol-Chester roads, the latter one of the few non-London
roads shown. (fn. 5) The most important local roads were the
saltways connecting Chester with Northwich, Middlewich, and Nantwich. (fn. 6) The main roads were improved
and in some cases realigned under turnpike Acts passed
between 1743 and 1787. They generally became the
trunk and major roads of the 20th century, the busier
ones being replaced by motorways or dual carriageways
from the 1970s. (fn. 7)
The London Road
The Roman road to London left Chester by the south
gate of the fortress, bridged the Dee, and recrossed the
river at Aldford. A direct line took it to Wroxeter
(Salop.) on Watling Street and thus to London. In
Cheshire the few lengths followed by modern roads
include that between Handbridge and Eaton park. (fn. 8)
The Roman road was disused by the 14th century,
when the London road went instead over Stamford
Bridge to Nantwich, Woore (Salop.), and Stone
(Staffs.), where it converged with the road from
Carlisle and the North to become one of the main
national thoroughfares. (fn. 9) In 1676 and 1780 carts set
out via Stamford Bridge but riders used an alternative
'horse road' through Christleton, crossing the Gowy
further south at the bridge called Hockenhull Platts
before rejoining the main road at Duddon heath. (fn. 10)
The London road was turnpiked from Staffordshire
southwards by the 1720s, and from Chester to the
Staffordshire border in 1743. (fn. 11) The Cheshire portion
came under a separate turnpike trust in 1755. (fn. 12) The Acts
of 1743 and 1755 prevented the trustees from building a
tollgate anywhere between Nantwich and Chester,
severely restricting the trust's income. As a result the
condition of the road, which was heavily used, remained
poor until an Act of 1769 empowered the trust to make
further improvements. (fn. 13) The road was disturnpiked in
1883. (fn. 14) Designated the A51 in the 20th century, it
remained the main London road until the m6 and m1
were fully opened in 1972. Access to the southbound m6
from Chester was improved when a new link road to the
motorway east of Nantwich was built in the mid 1980s.
Thereafter the shortest route to London followed the old
road via Tarvin, Tarporley, and Nantwich, all three of
which were bypassed in the 1980s. (fn. 15)
The Holyhead Road and North Wales
The Roman roads into north Wales left the London
road some way south of the fortress at Chester in order
to avoid the marshes around Saltney. (fn. 16) The more
southerly of the two routes, to Caer Gai (Merion.), is
largely marked by modern roads. The more northerly
ran parallel to the north Wales coast from Balderton to
Holywell (Flints.), then turned west across the mountains to Caernarfon. (fn. 17)
By the 14th century the route instead followed the
coast to Flint, Rhuddlan (Flints.), Conwy (Caern.),
and Bangor (Caern.). (fn. 18) In the later 16th century it took
a long inland detour from Flint to Denbigh and back
to the coast at Conwy. (fn. 19) By the 1670s the road left
Chester by the Dee Bridge and Hough Green, crossed
Saltney heath to Bretton (Flints.) and proceeded
thence through Hawarden across Halkyn mountain
to Denbigh. From there it followed what in the 20th
century were minor and mostly unclassified roads,
heading north-west to Bettws-yn-Rhos (Denb.), and
then west to the Conwy ferry and eventually Holyhead
(Ang.). (fn. 20)
In the turnpike era the mountainous stretches
beyond Denbigh were abandoned by most traffic in
favour of a more northerly route to Conwy through St.
Asaph and Abergele (Denb.). (fn. 21) The stretch from Chester
via Northop to Holywell and beyond was turnpiked in
1756, and the Chester-Northop road came under a
separate district in 1828. (fn. 22) As a whole the ChesterHolyhead road was described in 1822 as 'very imperfect': poorly surfaced, hilly, and under the divided
management of seven turnpike trusts. (fn. 23) Responsibility
for its maintenance remained divided, and the Chester
district was disturnpiked in 1883. (fn. 24) The road to Bangor,
later designated a trunk road, the A55, was improved in
stages from the late 1960s. (fn. 25)
Even before Thomas Telford's improvement of the
Holyhead road through mid Wales there was an
alternative to the London-Chester-Holyhead road via
Shrewsbury, Llangollen, Llanrwst (both Denb.), and
Bangor, described in 1778 as 'a hard, smooth, level
road . . . 27 miles nearer than by Chester', (fn. 26) and by
1789 passable in all weather. (fn. 27) Further improvement by
the Holyhead Road Commissioners and Telford had by
1822 made the London-Chester-Holyhead route
superfluous, though local traffic from Chester still
used it. (fn. 28) Chester's significance as a centre for road
traffic was thereby very much reduced.
The Dee fords at Blacon Point and Shotwick provided another route into north-east Wales. (fn. 29) After the
canalization of the river in the 1730s and the reclamation of Sealand, new roads were laid out by the Dee
Company under the River Dee Act of 1743 to serve the
ferries which replaced the fords. (fn. 30) The main road ran
the length of Sealand from the end of New Crane Street
in Chester to the Lower King's Ferry (later Queensferry), and other roads branched from it to the Higher
Ferry, Great Saughall, and Shotwick. They were transferred from the management of the Dee Company to
the local authorities in 1894. (fn. 31) Roads leading to the
Lower Ferry were effectively turnpiked between 1826
and 1838; under the last Act a new through road was
made from the Mersey ferries to Queensferry, taking
away from Chester all the direct traffic between Liverpool and north Wales. (fn. 32) The Lower King's Ferry Turnpike Trust expired in 1882. (fn. 33)
After a bridge was opened at Queensferry in 1897 (fn. 34)
Sealand Road became a busy route between Chester
and the industrial districts of Deeside. Use of the
Queensferry bridge as a western Chester bypass for
traffic to and from north Wales increased when a new
road leading to it (the A5117) was built in the early
1930s from Helsby on the Chester-Warrington road. (fn. 35)
The Welsh Borders
In the Middle Ages the important road south from
Chester through the Welsh Marches steered east of the
Roman road from Wroxeter to Caerleon (Mon.) to
take in Shrewsbury, Worcester, Gloucester, and Bristol.
Between Chester and Shrewsbury the route c. 1360 was
through Overton (Flints.) and Ellesmere (Salop.), but
c. 1480 went instead further east through Malpas and
Whitchurch. (fn. 36)
The Whitchurch road was diverted by stages over
most of its length away from the Roman line. The
ancient ford at Aldford, still used c. 1070, (fn. 37) had been
abandoned by c. 1200, when the way from Chester to
Aldford went instead by the Eastgate and the right bank
of the Dee. (fn. 38) In later centuries it served only as a minor
road connecting Chester with the villages in the Dee
valley and the bridge over the Dee at Farndon. It was a
turnpike as far as Worthenbury (Flints.) between 1854
and 1877. (fn. 39)
By 1315 the main Whitchurch road bypassed Aldford altogether, following a line through Boughton and
Christleton and then east of the modern main road to
No Man's Heath. (fn. 40) That remained the route in later
centuries, (fn. 41) heavily used by traffic for Shrewsbury and
London. A few miles in Cheshire were a turnpike
1705–26, (fn. 42) and the entire road from Chester to Whitchurch and Birmingham was turnpiked in 1759. (fn. 43) The
trust was wound up in 1877. (fn. 44) In the 20th century the
road was designated a trunk road as the A41 and
remained the main road between Chester and Shrewsbury. It was also the way to Bristol (fn. 45) until the M6 and
M5 were opened between the mid 1960s and 1971. (fn. 46)
The other principal way to Shrewsbury and the
Marches was via Wrexham. That road left the city by
the Dee Bridge and Handbridge and branched west
from the Roman road to Aldford along what was called
Bromfield or Wrexham Lane. (fn. 47) In the 17th century the
road led on beyond Wrexham to mid Wales, Brecon,
and Cardiff, (fn. 48) but the Chester-Wrexham part was
turnpiked in 1756 as an extension of the Shrewsbury
and Wrexham turnpike, whose trust supervised other
roads which gave access from Chester to Flint, Holywell, and Mold. (fn. 49) Beyond Handbridge a new stretch
was built west of the original line. The ChesterWrexham road was under a separate trust from
1828 (fn. 50) and was disturnpiked in 1877. (fn. 51) In the 20th
century it was numbered the A483, which continued to
Oswestry, Newtown (Mont.), and Brecon. By the early
1990s the whole route from Chester to Oswestry and
beyond had been replaced by a fast new road, mostly
dual carriageway. (fn. 52)
East and North-East
The Roman transpennine road from Chester left the
fortress at the east gate, crossed the river Gowy at
Stamford Bridge and headed in an almost straight line
to cross the Weaver at Northwich before turning north
for Manchester. (fn. 53) Most of that road remained in use as
a primary route in 2000. In the Middle Ages the
Northwich-Chester section, diverted through Kelsall
and Tarvin, was a saltway also known as 'Lynstrete',
'the road to the Lyme'. (fn. 54) In the late 16th century it was
regarded as the way not only to Manchester but to
cross the Pennines. (fn. 55) Its condition may have been poor,
since by the late 17th century the preferred route to
Manchester went instead through Frodsham, Warrington, and Salford (Lancs.). (fn. 56) The road via Northwich
and Altrincham was turnpiked in stages between 1753
and 1769 and thereafter the two routes were probably
regarded as alternatives. (fn. 57)
The route to Manchester through Frodsham and
Warrington followed what was probably a Roman
road (fn. 58) to cross the Mersey by Warrington bridge. (fn. 59) In
the 1370s the road left Chester by the Northgate and
turned right along Bag Lane (later George Street), (fn. 60) but
later the route went from the Eastgate along Cow Lane,
a road which in the 19th century was successively
renamed Warrington Street and Frodsham Street. (fn. 61)
Beyond Flookersbrook bridge the original course was
along the line later taken by Kilmorey Park, Newton
Hollows, Mannings Lane, and the Street as far as
Trafford Bridge. (fn. 62) The road was realigned through
the villages of Hoole and Mickle Trafford when it
was turnpiked as far as the existing turnpike at
Warrington in 1786. (fn. 63) It was disturnpiked in two
parts in 1870 and 1883. (fn. 64)
The turnpiking of the Warrington-Stockport road in
1820 (fn. 65) added another possible route between Chester
and Manchester, and it was that, via Frodsham and
Altrincham, which was designated the A56 in the 20th
century. The road was improved in the 1960s and
superseded in the 1970s by the M56 motorway, which
also provided the main access from Chester to the m6
northbound and the M62 into Yorkshire. (fn. 66)
In the Middle Ages the saltway from Middlewich to
Chester went via Winsford bridge to join the Northwich-Chester road just east of Kelsall. (fn. 67) It remained in
use in the 20th century.
Wirral
Stretches of a Roman road from the Northgate along
Wirral have been discovered, presumably leading to
the anchorage at Meols. (fn. 68) After the medieval decline of
the harbour there the roads into Wirral were of no
more than local importance. Their main function as
roads to Chester market is implied by the name
Portway, which in the 13th and 14th centuries was
applied to at least three of them, from West Kirby,
Whitby, and Ince. (fn. 69) Perhaps more important was
'Blakestrete', which in 1357 led from Chester to the
Mersey ferry at Birkenhead. (fn. 70) The Dee fords at Blacon
Point and Shotwick and the Wirral outports were
reached by the sands at low tide or by rough tracks
along the coast. (fn. 71)
In the early 18th century it took a day to travel to
Liverpool and back, via Eastham, (fn. 72) but the rise of
Liverpool and the emergence of Parkgate as a resort
and harbour for Ireland demanded better roads into
and across Wirral. Existing roads to Parkgate and the
Mersey ferries were turnpiked in 1787, the latter being
regarded as a main route from Liverpool to the south. (fn. 73)
The Wirral roads were disturnpiked in 1883. (fn. 74)
In the 20th century, the road from Chester to
Birkenhead increased in importance, taking traffic
generated by the growth of Ellesmere Port, the suburbanization of mid Wirral, and the opening of the
first Mersey road tunnel between Birkenhead and
Liverpool in 1934. (fn. 75) As the route between Liverpool
and Chester it was, however, entirely superseded when
the M53 Wirral motorway, connected to the second
Mersey road tunnel at Wallasey, was opened in 1971
north of Childer Thornton and extended by 1984 to
the outskirts of Chester. (fn. 76)
Bypasses
In the 20th century Chester was besieged by through
traffic (Fig. 36) and a ring-road outside the city
boundary was agreed upon as a necessity as early as
1922. (fn. 77) Planning began in 1924 and a short section in
Lache was opened in 1928 and named Circular Drive.
A longer stretch between Moston and Long Lane east
of the city was open by 1950. (fn. 78) The completion of the
road was impeded by protracted negotiations with
neighbouring authorities, cuts in local government
expenditure in 1931, the reduction of the central
government grant for road-building in 1934, the outbreak of the Second World War, post-war lack of
funds, and the failure of the Ministry of Transport to
make it a priority in the 1960s. (fn. 79) In the end the idea of
a complete ring-road was given up in favour of a dualcarriageway southerly bypass, opened in 1977, which
linked the eastern bypass with the improved A55 and
other roads into north Wales. The eastern bypass was
itself bypassed when the M53 was linked to the southern bypass in the early 1990s. At about the same time a
partial western bypass was constructed linking Liverpool Road, Parkgate Road, and Sealand Road. (fn. 80)
Bridges and Other River Crossings
Dee Bridge
Chester was the lowest bridging point on the Dee from
earliest times. Almost certainly the Romans built a
bridge on or near the site of the later structure; its
remains were identified on the river bed in 1984 and a
massive stone wall in Lower Bridge Street has been
interpreted as part of a causeway leading to it. (fn. 81) Its fate
after the Roman army left Chester is uncertain.
Figure 36:
Heavy traffic in Bridge Street, 1930s
By 1066 there was again a bridge, the burden for the
repair of which fell upon the men of Cheshire as a
whole. (fn. 82) In 1182–3, when the earldom was in royal
wardship, work was done on that bridge or its successor, but by 1227 it was claimed that it had collapsed. (fn. 83)
Money was again spent on repairs in 1241–2 and
between 1250 and 1254. (fn. 84) Further work, including the
erection of a brattice in the middle of the bridge, was
carried out in the 1270s, (fn. 85) but in 1279 or 1280 the
entire structure was allegedly carried away by a sea
flood. (fn. 86)
Until 1280 the responsibility for repairing the bridge
rested firmly with the comital administration and was
paid for out of the revenues from the county as a
whole. (fn. 87) By 1285, however, the men of Cheshire were
claiming that the city of Chester ought also to contribute to the costs, (fn. 88) and in 1288 it was agreed that the
landholders and inhabitants of the liberty would
sustain the southern part of the bridge provided the
county continued to take care of the rest. The terms of
the agreement make it clear that by 1288 the bridge
comprised stone piers and a timber superstructure
together with a causeway of compressed earth and
stone at the southern end. (fn. 89)
The destruction of the bridge in 1279 or 1280 led to
proposals that Chester abbey should also contribute
towards its maintenance. Although in 1284 the abbot
obtained a royal order in support of any exemption
proved by his charters, the matter was raised again after
a fresh collapse in 1316, when Abbot Thomas Birchills
complained that the sheriff of Cheshire had improperly
distrained oxen at his grange of Little Sutton to enforce
a contribution to the repairs. Examination of the
county records showed that the abbey had never so
contributed and judgement was given in favour of the
abbot. (fn. 90)
By 1346 the bridge once more required attention.
Responsibility for its repair was again disputed and a
claim against the abbot of St. Werburgh's was
revived. (fn. 91) In 1347 the Black Prince's mason and
surveyor, Henry of Snelson, was charged with oversight
of the work, and in 1348 payment was made to the
justice of Chester, Sir Thomas Ferrers, for repair to the
piers and arches of the bridge, and to the tower which
by then stood at the southern end. (fn. 92) Nevertheless, in
1351 it was still 'in such plight that no one [could] pass
over it'. (fn. 93) In that year it was agreed that the abbot and
the shire should contribute for a final time to the repair
and thenceforward be discharged of the responsibility
for ever. (fn. 94) A quarry was purchased to obtain the stone
necessary to complete the work, and by 1354 the bridge
was once more open. (fn. 95) During its closure a ford and a
ferry were maintained by the keeper of the passage of
Dee. (fn. 96) Evidently, however, work still remained to be
done, for in 1357 and 1358 it was found necessary to
order the mayor and citizens to make all speed with
that part of the bridge which was their responsibility,
and to complete the work in stone to match the rest. (fn. 97)
Figure 37:
Dee Bridge from east, 1810s
In 1387, when the bridge was once more 'destroyed
and broken', the entire responsibility for its repair was
apparently placed upon the citizens of Chester; to assist
in the work they were granted a murage (a special tax
usually assigned to the repair of the city walls), together
with 'all the profits of the passage of the said water at
Dee'. (fn. 98) The new work was protected by an order,
promulgated in 1394 and still in force in 1533, forbidding the passage of carts with iron-bound wheels. (fn. 99) It
included a tower at the southern end, to finish which it
was decided in 1407 to devote half the income from the
ensuing five years' murage. (fn. 100) That end of the bridge was
again repaired or renewed at the end of the 15th
century. (fn. 101)
Almost certainly the bridge which still spanned the
river in 2000 was substantially that reconstructed after
1387. Built of the local red sandstone, it originally
consisted of eight arches, later reduced to seven (four
segmental and three pointed), surmounted by a
carriageway with a stone parapet; (fn. 102) the southern gatehouse, which survived until the 1780s, stood between
the sixth and seventh arches from the Chester side. (fn. 103)
By the later 16th century the bridge was described as
ruinous, (fn. 104) and from the 1570s to the 1590s leases of the
gatehouse at the southern end obliged the tenant to
carry out repairs, apparently to the bridge itself as well
as to the buildings upon it; in 1594, for example, the
lessee Thomas Lyniall undertook to repair the structure
and to build 'fair and beautiful houses' on the tower
and south side. (fn. 105) Nevertheless, its condition remained a
matter of civic concern and the Assembly appointed
surveyors for its repair in 1623. (fn. 106)
During the siege of Chester the bridge seems to have
sustained no permanent damage. Charles I crossed it
twice in 1645, protected from the besiegers' view on his
return journey by specially erected blinds; and the
parliamentarians, unable to shake the citizens' hold
over it, bypassed it by building a bridge of boats a short
distance upstream. (fn. 107) Maintenance remained a civic
concern and further repairs were carried out in 1660
and 1704. (fn. 108)
Towards the end of the 18th century anxiety was
expressed about the narrowness and inconvenience of
the bridge and its approaches. The steep descent in
Lower Bridge Street was eased, the Bridgegate rebuilt,
and the gatehouse at the Handbridge end demolished. (fn. 109) Nevertheless, the structure itself remained
'very narrow and dangerous'. (fn. 110) The canalization of
the Dee had, no doubt, exacerbated the inconvenience
to travellers, since the heavily used fords lower down
the river had been replaced by less convenient ferries.
Fresh complaints were voiced at a public meeting in
1818, and for some years it was debated whether the
better solution would be to widen the existing bridge or
to build another. (fn. 111) Both policies were eventually
adopted. In 1824 the corporation decided that care
of the old bridge should be vested in the trustees of the
planned new bridge, and improvements were carried
out in 1826. The bridge was widened by 7 ft. on the
upstream side by adding an iron-plate footpath and
railings, and the road surface was macadamized. (fn. 112) Tolls
taken at the bridge tollhouse were let for over £3,000 in
1826 and 1827, but in 1829 the city judged it more
profitable to retain direct control and a paid collector
was appointed. (fn. 113) Tolls continued to be levied until
1885. (fn. 114)
Figure 38:
Grosvenor Bridge from west, soon after opening
The opening of the Grosvenor Bridge in 1832
created a new and much more convenient route out
of the city towards north Wales, leaving the old Dee
Bridge mainly to local traffic. It was adequate for such
use, (fn. 115) but improvements carried out at Handbridge in
the 1920s gave it a new lease of life as a thoroughfare,
and in 1933 the city council's improvement committee
began to consider a further widening. (fn. 116) By 1935,
however, it had been agreed that it would be preferable
to install traffic lights to restrict traffic using the bridge
to one direction at a time. (fn. 117) Lights remained there in
2000.
Grosvenor Bridge
In 1818 a committee was elected at a public meeting
at the Exchange to promote a Bill for an additional
bridge over the Dee at Chester and to commission an
architect for it. The bridge was to be situated on a
new road to run from the Wrexham road, south of
the river, to the Two Churches in Bridge Street, a
scheme which involved the destruction of St.
Bridget's church. Thomas Harrison was chosen as
architect and Thomas Telford and Marc Isambard
Brunel were also consulted. (fn. 118) An Act of 1825 established commissioners to implement the scheme. (fn. 119) The
elderly Harrison resigned as architect in 1826, to be
succeeded by one of his pupils, William Cole junior.
Harrison's final scheme for a bridge with a single
stone span of 200 ft. was apparently adopted with
only one significant amendment: plain abutments
with niches and pediments were substituted for the
paired columns in the original plans. (fn. 120) The bridge was
opened by Princess Victoria in October 1832. Built
largely of Peckforton and Chester sandstone, with
granite voussoirs, it was believed to be the largest
single-span stone bridge then in existence and
impressed contemporaries by its elegance and as a
feat of civil engineering. (fn. 121) The work also involved the
construction of tollhouses and gates and substantial
embankments along the approaches. Grosvenor
Bridge remained under the control of the Dee
Bridge Commissioners until 1885, when they were
bought out by the city corporation and the tolls were
abolished. (fn. 122)
Suspension Bridge
Another ornament to the city was the pedestrian
suspension bridge built by James Dredge in 1852 to
link the Groves with the new residential suburb of
Queen's Park. (fn. 123) Having become unsafe, it was taken
over by the corporation, which replaced it with a new
structure in 1923 (Fig. 39, p. 80.). (fn. 124) It survived in 2000.
Medieval Fords and Ferries
Besides the Dee Bridge, there were other crossing
points within or near the city liberties in the Middle
Ages. By the later 13th century a ford downstream
from Chester and just outside the liberties at Blacon
Point was in the custody of the Mainwaring family in
time of war. (fn. 125) Perhaps, too, the ford known later to have
been located upstream at Boughton was already used. (fn. 126)
By the mid 14th century a ferry in Chester itself
functioned under the control of a comital keeper at
periods when the Dee Bridge was not passable. (fn. 127)
Figure 39:
Suspension bridge of 1923, from the Groves
Figure 40:
Queens Ferry, mid 19th century
Below the Dee Bridge and Blacon ford was Shotwick
ford, of strategic importance in the early 14th century
when it carried a road used by the king's army called
'Saltesway', which began on Hoole heath and bypassed
Chester to the north. (fn. 128) Because the route from Chester
by the Dee Bridge into north Wales involved a long
detour through Lower Kinnerton to avoid the Saltney
marshes, travellers preferred the fords down river,
especially since they thereby escaped the tolls charged
at the bridge. Nevertheless, a journey across the
estuary's shifting sands was hazardous, and many
were drowned making the crossing. (fn. 129)
Later Ferries and Bridges
The Dee fords downstream from Chester were
destroyed by the cutting of a new river channel in the
1730s, and were replaced by two ferries. Under an Act
of 1744 the River Dee Company was to supply the
boats and maintain the roads leading to them. The
Higher Ferry was at Saltney; the lower ferry was
originally called King's Ferry, but was renamed
Queen's Ferry (later giving rise to the place name
Queensferry) after Victoria's accession. (fn. 130)
Both ferries were eventually superseded. The Victoria Jubilee toll bridge opened in 1897 to replace the
lower ferry. In 1926 it was rebuilt and made free of toll
and in 1962 it was supplemented by the Queensferry
bypass bridge a little to the east. (fn. 131) The higher ferry, at
Saltney, was replaced by a footbridge in 1968. (fn. 132)
Other Bridges within the Liberties
The northern boundary of the liberties, formed by the
stream known variously as Flooker's brook, Newton
brook, and Finchett's Gutter, was crossed from an early
period by stone bridges at Portpool, where it drained
into the Dee, and on the Mollington road. One of the
13th-century names for the former was Wyardesbridge,
possibly from a pre-Conquest personal name. To the
south of the Dee, a bridge carried the road to Eccleston
across the watercourse which formed the limit of the
city liberties. (fn. 133) At Saltney, too, the boundary between
the city and Flintshire was marked by a stone bridge in
the late Middle Ages. (fn. 134) A little to the east at Hough
Green a further bridge was built by the city corporation
in 1598–9 to ease the passage of loaded horses, carts,
and waggons through the Hollow Way. (fn. 135)
Figure 41:
Carriers' waggons at Falcon Inn, Lower Bridge Street, c. 1830
In 2000 no trace remained of any of those bridges.
They appear to have survived until the 17th century or
later, and indeed in 1691 the bridge at Hough Green
was repaired. The stone bridge at Portpool probably
disappeared with the canalization of the Dee, while the
others were presumably made redundant when the
streams which they crossed were covered over. (fn. 136)
Long-Distance Road Transport
By the 1580s regular carriers by waggon and packhorse
plied between Chester and London, then an eight-day
journey. (fn. 137) In the 1710s mail carriers ran from Chester
to Liverpool, Manchester, Kendal (Westmld.), St.
Asaph (Flints.), Oswestry (Salop.), and Oxford,
among other places. (fn. 138) By the 1790s there were three
main depots for long-distance waggons, the Wool Hall
in Northgate Street and two inns in Foregate Street,
the Blossoms and the Hop Pole. Between them they
sent goods daily to London, Birmingham, and Liverpool; thrice weekly to Wrexham, Whitchurch (Salop.),
Warrington, Manchester, and Middlewich; and weekly
to Oswestry and Shrewsbury. There was also a dense
network of carrying services throughout north Wales,
running weekly or less frequently to market towns as
far distant as Beaumaris (Ang.), Caernarfon, Pwllheli
(Caern.), Bala (Merion.), and Welshpool (Mont.).
They used a different set of inns, especially the
King's Head in Whitefriars and the White Bear and
the Falcon in Lower Bridge Street. (fn. 139) Such services
survived until the railways were built in the early
1840s. (fn. 140)
Nearby market towns without a direct railway link
had road carriers to Chester for much longer. In 1855
services were advertised to Hawarden (Flints.), Mold
(Flints.), Denbigh, Ruthin (Denb.), Cerrig-y-Drudion
(Denb.), Farndon, Malpas, Whitchurch, Tarporley,
Northwich, Runcorn, Warrington, Neston, and Parkgate. (fn. 141) As the railway lines became denser, many of
those were also discontinued, but carriers still ran to
Hawarden, Malpas, and Neston in the 1890s and to
Farndon and Tarporley as late as 1923. (fn. 142)
For passengers, a stage-coach service between
Chester and London was first projected in 1653 by
the operators of the London-York coaches. (fn. 143) A service
had certainly been started by three London partners
before 1657. It ran thrice a week in summer, travelling
via Stone (Staffs.) and taking four days, but only once a
week in winter. Alternative routes were evidently used
in the early, experimental years of the service, one via
Stone, Lichfield, and Coventry, and another via Newport (Salop.), Wolverhampton, and Birmingham. (fn. 144) In
the 1660s it settled into a pattern which remained
stable into the mid 18th century. The journey took four
days in summer and six in winter and mostly stopped
at the same inns for dinner and lodgings. As with other
early stage-coach services, the different partners in the
business were each responsible for one stretch of the
road. In the 1680s, for example, the Londoner John
Holloway operated the Chester end from premises at
Whitchurch (Salop.), where he had two coaches and
three teams of four horses. He clearly ran the same sort
of service as that taken between Chester and London by
Nicholas Blundell of Little Crosby (Lancs.) in the
summers of 1717 and 1723: dinner on the first day
at Whitchurch, the first night's lodging at Newport,
and dinner on the second day at the Welsh Harp at
Stonnall (in Shenstone, Staffs.), where the next
partner's part of the service began. Blundell's stops
further south were at Coventry (lodgings), Northampton (dinner), Woburn (Beds.) (lodgings), and St.
Albans (Herts.) (dinner). (fn. 145)
Figure 42:
Coach at Albion Hotel, Lower Bridge Street, 1852
From the 1770s services to London (now taking only
two days on improved roads) and other major towns
proliferated, reaching a peak in the 1830s. (fn. 146) In the later
1770s competition on the London service brought
prices down and offered alternative routes, thus
making a direct connexion between Chester and a
much larger range of provincial towns. The first regular
coaches to Liverpool, via Eastham ferry, ran in 1784, (fn. 147)
and by 1818 there were as many as eight a day.
Manchester could be reached directly by road or by a
connecting packet boat on the canal at Preston Brook.
At the high point of the coaching era in the 1830s there
were also direct coaches at least daily to Shrewsbury,
Birmingham, Welshpool, Wrexham, and Oswestry.
The main coaching inns were the White Lion and the
Pied Bull in Northgate Street and the Yacht in Watergate Street. (fn. 148)
Long-distance coaching was destroyed by the railways, but horse-drawn omnibuses continued to ply
local routes not served by rail. In 1855 there were daily
services for passengers to Mold, Ruthin, Flint, and
Holywell (Flints.); Tarvin, Northwich, Knutsford, and
Manchester; and Malpas and Whitchurch, all setting
out from the Eastgate Inn. (fn. 149) Tarporley, Tarvin, and
Kelsall still had horse omnibuses from Chester twice
a week in 1880. (fn. 150)
The first motor bus service from Chester began in
1911 to Ellesmere Port, which was not served directly by
rail. (fn. 151) The service was operated by Crosville Motor Co.,
which had been founded in 1906 by George CroslandTaylor to build motor cars but quickly abandoned that
enterprise. Passenger transport became the sole business, other routes were soon added, and the company
expanded first by putting on workmen's services to
munitions factories on Deeside during the First World
War, and then hugely after 1918 by aggressive business
tactics against its rivals in a largely unregulated market.
The company was bought by the London, Midland, and
Scottish Railway in 1929 and passed to Tilling-B.A.T.,
the national bus company, a year later. By 1935 Crosville was one of the biggest bus operators in the country,
with 47 depots and 1,000 vehicles carrying 100 million
passengers on routes concentrated in north and mid
Wales, Cheshire, and south-west Lancashire. The company had offices and engineering works at Crane Wharf
and a depot at Liverpool Road.
By 1927 Crosville ran 48 routes from Chester,
reaching throughout west Cheshire and north-east
Wales. (fn. 152) At first there were numerous other small bus
operators from the city, mostly based in the villages
around Chester, but Crosville gradually bought them
up or forced them out of business, so that its only
long-term local rival was the Wrexham & District
Transport Co., which ran a few services into Wales.
The city council normally refused to license rival
operators on routes which already had a good bus
service, reinforcing Crosville's near-monopoly, though
the policy also protected small operators where they
survived. (fn. 153) Crosville started coach services to London
in 1928, (fn. 154) and in the 1930s began running many
excursions and tours. (fn. 155)
Figure 43:
Delamere Street bus station
When bus services were deregulated in 1986 Crosville was split up, but both the Welsh and the Merseyside companies which were formed passed into the
successive ownership of British Bus plc and the Cowie
Group, emerging after 1997 respectively as Arriva
Cymru and Arriva North West, which between them
provided services from Chester to nearby towns in
Cheshire, north-east Wales, and Merseyside. (fn. 156) The
Liverpool Road bus depot, however, belonged in
2000 to a rival bus company, First Group.