Alone Beneath The Sky: The Leicester Circular 29/03/17

17.5 miles, via Humberstone Heights, Northfields, Rushey Mead, Belgrave, Abbey,
New Parks, Western Park, Braunstone Park, Rowley Fields, Aylestone, Knighton Fields,
South Knighton, Stoneygate, Horston Hill, & Crown Hills.

The end of March is time to go Down Country to see My Parents and to help out around their house for a few days, and having already done city circulars in Leeds and Bradford, doing one on the city of my births seems like a good plan whilst I'm here, as does seeking out the remnants of the Leicester Corporation Tramways, long lost to history, grown between 1874 and 1927, electrified in 1904 and closed down from 1933 to 1949, a rough plot the termini of which gives me a tour of some 17 miles. So, a more modestly sized city than those of West Yorkshire gives a circuit that is much longer, but this will take in a lot of suburbia as well as the limits of the Victorian - Edwardian city, and this will be the best opportunity to put in a significantly long distance down before the bright and warm days of late Spring arrive, and thus we steel ourselves for a long day, starting out at The Terminus on Uppingham Road by the 1934 tram shelter, our constant local companion, and set out in search of the other remaining shelters about the city as well as the end point of every other line on the city's major arteries. Head off anti-clockwise for a change, pushing up the suburban lane of Humberstone Drive, between the suburbia that grew on the Humberstone Hall site and the council estates to the west, heading in the direction of Humberstone village but pulling away at the Thurmaston Lane corner and noting that the grounds of the Towers Hospital, the former lunatic asylum, has been completely redeveloped residentially, dropping a wholly new settlement into the local landscape, which I'll call Humberstone Heights, after the local golf course. Join Gipsy Lane for the westward push, looking into the new suburbia and noting that most of the old hospital buildings have endured, sure to get an executive makeover in the future, for all those who'd wish to put up with the local ghosts, and than its on, over the A6030 link road that took decades to arrive, and on into the district of Northfields, where council houses and terraces face each other at quite a remove from the city, as well as containing The Salutation Inn, one of the most infamously rough pubs in the locality. Then we pass below the Midland Mainline under the low bridge that still seems to attracts regular collisions with wayward high vehicles, and on to the Catherine Street corner, often pronounced incorrectly by non locals, and home to the BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir Hindu temple, which has such an elaborate makeover that you'd never believe that it used to be a factory.

Gipsy Lane resumes, the council house to the south being one of the best presented groups in the city, and on past the country inn styled pub, The Gipsy, that's now a Gurdwara, before passing the very large and very Victorian Rushey Mead primary school, one of those rare old schools still in use, where My Mother taught for most on the 1980s and 90s, and then on again down Marfitt Street among the Leicester-ish terraces to meet the A607 Melton Road, and the top of Leicester's Golden Mile, the city's nationally famous drag of Asian Shops. It's also the Roman Fosse Way and home to the first terminus point on our trail, where no shelter remains, but there's still a bus stop by Rushey Mead fields, just beyond where the terraces end, and the next one won't be such a distance away as we lead off down Lanesborough Road, at the very top of Belgrave's suburban growth, leading us to Bath Street where small fragments of the Victorian terraces endure among the semis. This is the best shortcut to Loughborough Road, where a short distance away, beyond the Bull's Head, Lidl and the Bestway Cash & Carrry stood another tram terminus, of which naught remains, again, and thus attention turns back to Belgrave village, where a fascinating selection of Georgian red brick houses can be found along Thurcaston Road and Church Road. It's also home to The Talbot, a pub named after the dog not the car manufacturer, the granite-y church of St Peter, and the frustration that it's the back of Belgrave Hall faces the road, but I'd guess that nearly every child in the city has seen the front having school-visited it at some stage, and it leads us on to Thurcaston Road bridge, the ancient crossing of the Soar, where we've been before on our tour along Leicester's canal. Into the north-west quarter of the city, and take a turn down Beaumanor Road, as it keeps us away from the traffic of Abbey lane for a while, but also because it's one of the few terraces in this part of the town, home to the Tom Hoskins, one of the most Leicester City FC-ish establishments in the city, and it leads us down to the end of Corportaion Road, home to the Abbey Pumping station and the National Space Centre, neither of which have conveniently dropped onto my trails, as yet.

Join Abbey Road, the A6, and this dual carriageway is tree-lined and suburban to the west, industrial and commercial to the east, and it's never been clear why the 19th Century city didn't get out here, all the growth having come in the inter-war years of the 20th, while the growth of Pioneer Park suggests that a 21st Century renaissance for the former industrial lands down to the riverside is imminent. Arrive at the top right corner of Abbey Park, and the titular road to the east was home to the Corporation tram depot, which continued in use as the bus depot for Citybus and First until as recently as 2007, but is no longer worthy of detour as it has been completely demolished, and so we swing west onto Blackbird Road, part of the city's old western relief roads built before such things existed, on among more industry and the huge branch of B&Q. Swinging south we pass below where the GCR mainline once passed over on its way to the city, the 19th century high speed line that the 20th casually discarded, and then the tree lined and suburban lane resumes, following on of the old tram routes, past The Blackbird on the Anstey Road corner and below the workmen doing tree surgery, that will show to be a project that is on-going city-wide. At the Woodgate - Fosse Road North (not the actual Fosse Way) junction, we meet the edge of the older terraced city again, as well as our first proper tram relic in the shelter by the Groby Road allotments, but styled as nicely as the other Art Deco variants, squarer and cheaper looking, and not having an obvious constituency, which makes it survival all the more remarkable. Buoyed by our first fin we push on up the A50, looking a lot like my end of the city as it shared the same estate developer, the Sheriffs, in the 1930s, to the end of another tram line, where again nothing remains on the corner of Garland Crescent, but a turn into Stokeswood Park has us passing familiar territory once again, crossing the Leicester & Swannington railway path and then ascending up through the parklands up to the district of New Parks. I always thought that this visually unappealing council estate had a name plucked out of the air, but it seems it was named after the house that original possessed the park that we've just passed though, and the new estate does at least attempt some interesting features, with a Crescent and a Circus found along Pindar Road and Coates Avenue.

Letchworth Road transitions into the more politely suburban Western Park, leading down and up again to Glenfield Road, immediately recognised as home to family friends and the school where many Model Railway exhibitions were held, both having gone now, friends deceased and school rebuilt, and we pace the side of this noisy concrete road to find a way into Western Park itself. Once the western edge of the old city, a common naming theme it seems, it's now perhaps the best of all the city's suburban parks, with adventure playground, bowling greens and old park houses at it heart, and its tree-lined boulevard is also a feature to admire, at least once I've paused for lunch and protected my pizza from the many hungry dogs who are out for a walk. Altogether a good spot, nicely wild and not overly manicured, and well-treated by it patrons, the lane leading us down past the former schools and the very upscale terraces on the way out to Hinckley Road, where the theme of tram shelters and parkland can be continued as we meet our third tram shelter, just like the one on Uppingham Road, though this one still has its dedication plaque and is probably in the best condition of all of them, but even here it lacks its benches, removed even in these parts to discourage dossing. The A47 Hinckley Road leads us west, past the very last terraces on this side of town, and up over the railway line to Coalville and Burton, soon hitting the edge of the Braunstone council estate by the leisure centre and the URC, though we won't be getting too close to either half of this considerable district, instead joining the path that runs up though the middle of Braunstone Park. We pace along the old driveway up to the Georgian Braunstone Hall, the red brick centre piece of the park and one time school, which is finally being redeemed after more than 20 years of disuse. The declining path to the south doesn't offer the elevated views that might be expected, but the parkland give Braunstone a vast natural lung that seems well-liked, and after passing more tree surgery going on, it's out of the parklands and across the circus island at Gooding Avenue, as the edge of the estate is met on Fullhurst Avenue, which takes us across Fosse Road South, which is again not actually the Fosse Way.

This is met a block further on, as we hit the A5460 Narborough Road, still the A46 in my mind, and it's only a short stretch towards the town that we meet the final tram shelter sat by St Mary's Fields, which puts a clear indication of old parks being the outer limits of the city, it also has a Corporation substation building nearby, and there used to be one of those on Uppingham Road too, which has you wondering if they were related to the tramway or if they were just coincidental. That's the last one we'll be seeing on the circuit, the fifth one on Western Boulevard being much closer to the city and thus failing to fall into this trail, and thus we press on south by the dual carriageway, the red route to the motorways and the south of England, past the late Edwardian terraces and subsequent semis of the district of what I think is Rowley Fields, which may have been named after Arthur, if not the other way around. Our junction comes at the city's edge, peeling east by the Premier Inn and the landmark Sturgess garage (or car dealership), taking Braunstone Lane East out over Aylestone Meadows, the floodlands to the south of the city that have the Rivers Biam and Soar running through them, as well as the Grand Union Can and the former GCR line (both previously walked), the overbridge of the latter being the home to My Sister's funniest story ever. The rise beyond leads us into Aylestone, another village consumed by the expanding city, and there's some older flavour to be had on the road past St Andrew's church and The Union Inn, another pub still basking in the glow of Leicester City's Premier league win, and soon enough we're on Aylestone Road, the A426, and it's not far up the shopping parade that we find another tramline end, adjacent to another small park and opposite the terrace of houses named after locations in Jersey. Aylestone Hall and Gardens provide some greenery, a house with a long and tangled history and a useful restroom break before we press on north through the suburban sprawl up to the knot of terraces, and a break onto Duncan Street will lead us in the direction of Grace Road cricket ground, home of three times County Champions Leicestershire, and a pace up Milligan Road will take us in sight of the square and the playing field, where cricket of uncertain provenance is going on under typically Spring like grey skies.

The terraces beyond Grace Road itself could get a wanderer lost, but good instincts, along with Knighton Lane lead us to Saffron Lane, next to The Midland pub and across the way from Aylestone Rec and the neighbouring leisure centre, and it's not a corner of the city that I know at all, so a map and time check are in order to get us going in the right direction, east along the northern edge of the park, and onto Knighton Lane East. This takes us under the Midland Mainline once again, on a much grander scale this time as the railway cruises overhead on the grand seven arched viaduct in blue engineering bricks, and the path beyond leads us into the Knighton Fields estate, in yet another style from the city's pattern book of council house, and we lead up Aston Hill to Heather Road to cut off a corner and to discover that this was once the driveway to Knighton Fields House, which is now Millgate School. We're into the post-school traffic as we emerge onto Welford Road, the old A50, where there's more trees forming a boulevard and another tramline end to be found where the terraces appear, a stretch where My Parents rented their first home after marrying, and where the family dentist is still to be found, it might also be the only terminus where there wasn't a park of any description. Legs feel tired as we press into the outer suburbia along Houlditch Road and Northcote Road, uncertain of where the turn towards London Road should come, eventually rolling all the way to Knighton Road and St Thomas More RC church, taking the turn southwards to Carisbrooke Road, where the University of Leicester own some property of note and the descending road leads us into that land of suburbs that look like the sort of place that you might aspire to live if every decision you made in life turned out to be a good one. Knighton Church Road continues the eastward tack, providing fascinating mix of expensive suburbia, and no obvious church, as we pace on through South Knighton, and even though there are terraces along here, this earliest suburban growth on the city would certainly ensure that they are much more expensive than elsewhere in the city. We hit memory lane as we land upon the A6 London Road, the route often travelled on the way to school in Oadby, and the last tram terminus on the tour provide us with something more impressive than a shelter as here a suburban tram shed survives, housing four trams and closed since 1922 and on a plot that has somehow escaped redevelopment, sat at the very edge of the city, a good finale to the tramway tour.

Of course the circuit needs completing despite my legs having run low on enthusiasm, and my not-a-hernia pain is giving me more pain that its due as we walk the roadside towards Leicester Racecourse before turning north onto Glebe Road, which leads us past Leicester University's Botanical gardens and various halls of residence and onwards into Stoneygate, that landscape of house that you couldn't even start to dream about being ever able to afford, a place that is notable for the fact that despite its proximity, it is not incorporated into the city. Stoughton Drive South leads us up to Gartree Road and we're out of this most ostentatious of districts as we re-enter the city and meet the A6 - A47 link road, and the A6030 Stoughton Drive will lead us up the perimeter of Leicester Golf Course and into the suburbia that has grown out this far, and this district around Evington Lane doesn't have a clear identity, so I'll dub it Horston Hill after the name on the OS map of a century ago. It seems we've stored up the hills for the last stretch so as the roads provide straight-forwards paths, the rises and falls keep coming, as Wakerley Road drops downhill, with the houses far enough apart to accommodate a dual carriageway, and the altitude teases views across the city towards Charnwood Forest that just can't quite be grasped between the houses. Descend to Ethel Road and then set uphill again, toward the entrance to the City General, the hospital where I was born, and past the end of Gwendolen Road, where My Grandma lived out her final year, and then it's another long sweeping decline, which reveals just how infrequently some relatively local roads were travelled back in the day, as the suburban profile of Broad Avenue is one I don't recognise at all. Familiarity returns as we hit the tree cover on Coleman Road, shrouding the edge of the Crown Hills estate and St Chad's church, dropping down to the Full Moon (former) and our favoured chippy on the corner of Green Lane Road, and this provides a short cut to the finish line as we move onto Freeman Road North, which leads us over Bushby Brook and below the long last GNR Leicester branch, before we take the Saltersford Road entrance into Humberstone Park. Our trails have led us here before, but this time we can take a path to pass out of the entrance by the lodge house which leads us onto the Uppingham Road once again, right next to the tram shelter to close the circle at 4.55pm, ending a day that has honestly been far too long, finishing so late that the Humberstone Park café has closed, and a revivifying brew will have to be obtained at My Parents' house, a mile or so's limp away.

5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 2655.7 miles
2017 Total: 90.7 miles
Up Country Total: 2411.4 miles
Solo Total: 2400.4 miles