Urban Transformation in Liverpool and Manchester, 1918–1939

Abstract

Liverpool and Manchester have come to typify twentieth-century urban decay and their demise is strongly associated with the perceived decline of local government after 1918. By the 1930s, contemporaries had stereotyped northern cities as places of poverty and deprivation, in comparison to the prosperous south. The divide was reinforced by economic historians who focused on regional variations in unemployment and economic depression. This article challenges stereotypical images of interwar Liverpool and Manchester by illustrating the ambitious programmes of urban redevelopment implemented by their Corporations in response to political and economic instability. Grandiose projects such as the Wythenshawe Estate, Mersey Tunnel and Manchester Central Library aimed to stimulate employment and to boost local economies and morale. Redevelopment was promoted heavily to present new images of Liverpool and Manchester. Crucially, urban transformation was marketed as a way to communicate with the newly enfranchised, classless citizen and suggests similarities with broader strategies employed by the Conservative party to engage with the mass electorate. The level of ambition and innovation demonstrates that local municipal culture thrived and Liverpool (with close American links) is shown to have been at the forefront of innovations in civic design and urban planning.

Review of periodical literature published in 2012

“…Meanwhile, Whyte provides a critical assessment of the 1910 International Town Planning Conference held in London, arguing that for all its transnational credentials and scope it also served as a vehicle for the articulation of local ambitions and national peculiarities. Wildman explores the fruits of some of these ambitions in the context of Liverpool and Manchester during the interwar period, where she finds an innovative culture of civic design and urban planning, as manifest in grandiose projects such as the Wythenshawe Estate, the Mersey Tunnel, and Manchester Central Library.…”

Uncertain Progress: British Kitchens in the 1920S

“…1 However, for many such families, the invisibility of the kitchen was to change over the decade, because the "Servant Problem" 2 made widespread employment of domestic staff more difficult (see, for example, Guardian 1921b). Furthermore, expansion of urban white-collar employment in some parts of Britain fuelled substantial suburban house building to accommodate them (see, for example, Jackson 1973;White 2001;Wildman 2012). There was also something of a fashion for converting the interiors of large older properties to a number of apartments ("flatting") (Times 1921a).…”

‘A nation of town criers’: civic publicity and historical pageantry in inter-war Britain

“…17 But more general civic activity was not always predetermined by these factors, and local vibrancy, especially on a more socially inclusive level, was obtained in other ways -as some urban historians are beginning to show. 18 A professionalized and bureaucratic local state, supported by remnants of middle-class civic culture, showed remarkable ambition in the inter-war period. 19 Pageants are a testament to this spirit, and a rebuke to the notion that inter-war urban culture had declined from a supposed Victorian heyday.…”