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Report - - Porter Street Bridge Warehouses (Liverpool, 2018) | Industrial Sites | 28DaysLater.co.uk

Report - Porter Street Bridge Warehouses (Liverpool, 2018)

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urbanchemist

28DL Regular User
Regular User
A couple of warehouses connected by a little bridge, the only ones like this in Liverpool apart from the southern pair of tobacco warehouses at Stanley Dock.

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I was reminded of these two because they featured in a recent post in which someone had wandered around this area taking pictures of the outsides of buildings.

As it turned out there wasn't much to see inside, at least in 2018, so this report is really more for the record.


My original motivation was to check if they contained any hydraulically-powered lifting gear, since a nearby warehouse did have some.

Pressurised water was the Victorian equivalent of electricity in some industrial areas, and surviving examples of water-powered machinery are rare.

But alas no hydraulic epic here - these two only had more recent electrically powered hoists.


Background. The buildings we’re taking about, A and B on the satellite view below, were evidently once part of the same factory as shown on a 1950 map, hence the bridge.

Warehouse C has already been reported and contained the remains of what may have been a manually powered hoist
.

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The only historical information I have found about the factory is that it made ship’s biscuits which were sent to West Africa and the Faroe Isles, with the B section, which closed in 1971, making dog food and dog biscuits.

These days the first few floors of A are occupied by a shop selling second-hand office furniture and general collectables.

It’s only the top floors which are unused, with missing windows and pigeons - I think the eastern half with the flat roof is now a separate building.

A local told me that B was subsequently either used or owned by Echo and The Bunnymen, consistent with what was left in there.


Starting with A, front and rear views.

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Names on the loading bays at the front and rear, ‘The Sandon Motor and Engineering Company Co Ltd’ and ‘Guy and Hunter’.

I’ve always assumed, maybe wrongly, that these are names of the companies who originally occupied the warehouse rather than whoever made the ironwork.

If so this seems to be another warehouse used by the Sandon people, whose name is also on the Engineering Works place down the road.

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There could be three hoists here judging by the number of vertical loading bays. I found two, one in a room at the rear…

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…and a larger one with red cowling at the front.

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Front and back views of warehouse B, with a date (1903) on the front.

This one was rather difficult to get into needing an early morning climb, which is why the pictures are a bit gloomy.

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A sign over the back door and a name on a loading bay (C S Kirkland).

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Interior pictures go from the basement up.

Although now empty it looks like the third floor may have been connected with the music industry.

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Sunrise.

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There could have been two hoists here - I only found one, for the loading bay next to the bridge.

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Next to the loading bay is a strap workers used to avoid getting pulled out of the doors when handling goods.

The old photo shows one in use in the Albert Dock.

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A view from the bridge across the Mersey.

Whoever lives in the converted warehouse next door has a much better view from their balcony, at least until Peel build skyscrapers on the wasteland in front.

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Finally a view from A towards the city centre with another warehouse on Vulcan street on the right, currently a music rehearsal place.

In front and below the Vulcan warehouse is the roof of B, and behind and to the left the Waterloo warehouse, long converted into apartments.

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Warehouses A and B are part of the ’10 streets’ plan to redevelop this area of the docklands, so are likely to be renovated in the next few years.
 
Last edited:

HughieD

28DL Regular User
Regular User
You always make everywhere look ace! And that old tin - My God! It's either film or an audio recording of Echo and the Bunnymen! It needs rescuing!!!
 

urbanchemist

28DL Regular User
Regular User
Adding some pictures of the rest of these warehouses here.

As mentioned above, the bottom few floors of the more northerly warehouse between Porter and Regent streets used to be a second-hand office furniture and bric-a-brac place (called IBS although they didn’t believe in advertising).

I’ve got some stuff from there over the years including a little 70s booklet on the local power station, which annoyingly I seem to have lost.

Anyway, the shop seems to have shut in the last couple of years and the whole place is now empty.

The revisit was really to find a hoist I missed first time although these are not the interesting manually or water-powered ones, just electric winches, maybe from the 1930-1950 period.



Pictures are ordered upwards.

Authentically grotty partial basement.


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Loading bay and one of the internal lifts in the reception area behind.


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The rest is just empty spaces - this place has something in common with the now demolished United Mersey Supplies warehouse up the road, with some glass brick windows and a fenced-off area for more valuable goods.


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A different view of the same area as pictured in the first post, with a hoist over loading bay doors.



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The hoist which I missed before, over what is now a window.

Both hoists are the same but I didn’t notice a maker’s name.


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Loading bays for the hoists from the outside.


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Random things on the walls.


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Now out onto a flat roof that wasn’t previously accessible - this is over a windowless block which may still be in use.

Pictures of the large single hoist in gabled roof bit are shown in the first post.

There were two more hoists in little huts here, both the same, made by The Sandon Motor & Engineering Company.

Seems these people made warehouse hoists as well as warehouse doors.


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Loading bays for these hoists from ground level.


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Finally a view west down Porter Street - the warehouse with the Bunnymen stuff is over the bridge on the left.


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And a view north, with the Tobacco Warehouses on the horizon and the Bonded Tea Warehouse with green doors in front on the right.


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