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Poynton

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For people named Poynton, see Poynton (surname).
Poynton
Poynton's town centre
Population14,433 (2001)
OS grid referenceSJ925835
Civil parish
  • Poynton with Worth
Unitary authority
Ceremonial county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townSTOCKPORT
Postcode districtSK12
Dialling code01625
PoliceCheshire
FireCheshire
AmbulanceNorth West
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Cheshire

Poynton is a town within the civil parish of Poynton-with-Worth, and the unitary authority area of Cheshire East, England. For ceremonial purposes it is part of the county of Cheshire, but the border between Cheshire and Greater Manchester (Poynton Brook) runs through the town. Poynton is located at the easternmost fringe of the Cheshire Plain, 7 miles (11 km) north of Macclesfield, 5 miles (8 km) south of Stockport and 11 miles (18 km) south-southeast of Manchester. At the time of the United Kingdom Census 2001, Poynton-with-Worth had a population of 14,433, ranking it 44th on the Greater Manchester Urban Area.[1]

The name of Poynton is of Old English derivation, indicating ancient settlement by the Anglo-Saxons. From the late middle ages coal has been mined in Poynton. The collieries, under the ownership of the Lords Vernon, from 1832 until their closure in 1935 they were the largest in Cheshire. Consequent urbanisation and socioeconomic development necessitated better transport links; these came with the completion of the Macclesfield Canal through Poynton in 1831 and the arrival of the Manchester and Birmingham Railway in 1845 and the Macclesfield, Bollington and Marple Railway in 1869. By the late 20th century, Poynton had emerged as a commuter town, partly because of the transport links and because it forms part of the Greater Manchester Urban Area.

History

See also: History of Cheshire

The name of Poynton is of Old English derivation. Having been omitted by the Domesday Book of 1086, the first mention of the manor of Poynton is in 1289 when it was part of the barony of Stockport. Past spellings include Ponynton and Poynington[2] The Warren family held the manor from before 1386 when Edward de Warren married Cicely de Eton of Poynton and Stockport until 1801 when Sir George Warren, the last surviving male, died. He was succeeded by his daughter, Lady Warren Bulkeley. She died childless in 1826 when she left the estate to Frances Maria Warren,[3] Lady Vernon.[2] The Lords Vernon held the estate until the final sale in 1920.

Coal is found outcropping to the east of Towers Road, which corresponds to the line of the Red Rock Fault; that is at the surface. It has been worked from early times. The earliest record to be found is a lease dated 28 February 1589, which talks of the "Coal pit at Wourthe lately occupied by George Finche". This could be worked on the surface then by bell pits, and then by deeper shafts with waterwheels or steam engines operating pumps and winding gear. Around 1700, the Warrens of Poynton co-operated with the Leghs of Lyme to work the Cannel and Sheepwash seams at Norbury Hollow.[4] Initially, the mines were pumped using waterwheels driven by the Norbury Brook; atmospheric steam engines were then used and then condensing engines thus allowing deeper pits to be sunk. Output in 1789 was over 23,586.80 metric tons (26,000 tons) rising to a peak production of 221,056.42 metric tons (243,673 tons) in 1859.[5] The Poynton Colleries were substantial, and the coal rights were held by the Warren family who leased them the Wrights and the Claytons. The canal and new roads and railway lines were used to remove the coal, In 1826 the estate passed to George John Venables Vernon, 4th Lord Vernon who decided in 1832 to manage the mines himeself.[4] In 1856 it was estimated that there was a reserve of 15,163,027 tons which would supply 245,000 tons for 61 years. This was to be supplied by the Park Round Pit,[6] and the Park Oval Pit both working the Four Foot and Five Foot Seam and the Anson Pit and the Nelson Pit which were working the Accommodation Seam.[7] The pits had good transport links to their principal markets, Cotton Mills of the Manchester conurbation. With the Lancashire Cotton Famine, 1861 and the subsequent recession, the price of coal collapsed, the vend dropped 112,840 tons. Men were laid off. A new shaft, the Lawrance Pit was sunk at Park, in 1885 raising the vend to vend of 216,362 tons and paying for itself within a year.[8] However the costs were rising and the closure of the Norbury Pits resulted in a constant ingress of water. In 1926 production was down to 80,146 tons. in the year of the general strike. The 1926 General strike lasted for 17 weeks in Poynton and the men went back to work as the collieries would have closed due to the cost of pumping. The collieries closed on 30 August 1935; 250 men were made redundant. 80 men were offered jobs in Kent, and some secured employment with Avro at Woodford, Greater Manchester.[9] The Anson Colliery is now the site of the Anson Engine Museum, all other shafts have been capped and Park Pit has been levelled.

Cottages originally built for miners at the bottom of the Coppice in Poynton

The Macclesfield Canal was originally proposed in 1765, but construction was not commenced until 1826 due to opposition from outside parties. Thomas Telford was the designer and the canal was completed in 1831. The original coal wharf at Higher Poynton is now used for boatfitting. Sir George Warren was a promoter of the extension of the turnpike road from Manchester by way of Hazel Grove to Sandon in Staffordshire where it joined what is now the A51 road. The Manchester and Birmingham Railway Railway opened a line through Poynton in 1845 which today forms part of the London–Manchester main line. The station on this line, offers local services to Manchester and Macclesfield. The Macclesfield, Bollington and Marple railway was opened in 1869, with stations at Higher Poynton and Middlewood, and was closed in 1970. The line is now a footpath called the Middlewood Way.

During the late 18th century, the Pickford family developed their family business of waggoners on the London-to-Manchester route with The Birches Farm at Poynton as its headquarters. The business thrived and they relocated to London in 1823. Pickfords is today one of the best known removal firms in the United Kingdom.

From the 1870s private house-building gathered pace and gradually Poynton became a commuter town for those working in the Manchester conurbation. Since the Second World War several housing estates have been built by both the local authorities and private developers.

The population has risen from 5000 to over 15,000 since 1945.

Governance

Terraced housing opposite Vernon School on Bulkeley Road in Poynton

From 1974 until the 2009 structural changes to local government in England, Poynton was administered by three tiers of local government: the parish council of Poynton-with-Worth, Macclesfield Borough Council and Cheshire County Council. Poynton-with-Worth (a civil parish) was made up of three electoral wards and was created in 1880 by uniting the hitherto separate civil parishes of Poynton and Worth.[10] Cheshire East Council took over the responsibilities of the borough council and the county council on 1 April 2009, and the parish council has been renamed to Poynton Town Council.[11] The Poynton electoral ward is represented on Cheshire East Council by three councillors, all members of the Conservative Party. Cheshire East Council has 81 councillors in 27 wards, of whom 59 are Conservative, 12 are Liberal Democrats, 6 are Labour and four others.[12] The boundaries are being reviewed, and the 2011 election will be for an 82 member council. Poynton and Adlington will be represented by two, two-member wards called Poynton West, and Poynton East and Adlington.[13] For the United Kingdom Parliament it is in the Macclesfield Constituency which in 2009 was represented by Sir Nicholas Winterton, a Conservative. In 2010, David Rutley, a Conservative was elected after Sir Nicholas Winterton retired.

Poynton is twinned with Érd in Hungary.

Geography

A view of Greater Manchester from Poynton. Manchester city centre is 11 miles (18 km) from the town.

Poynton is located at SJ925835 53°20′53″N 2°06′50″W / 53.348°N 2.114°W / 53.348; -2.114, between the Norbury Brook and the Poynton Brook at the eastern most limit of the Cheshire Plain. The land is between 88 metres (289 ft) and 148 metres (486 ft) above sea level. The town is approximately 17 kilometres (11 mi) SSE of Manchester, 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) from Manchester Airport, 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) from junction 5 of the M56 motorway and 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) from junction 3 of the M60 motorway. The west of the parish is predominantly residential, with diverse amenities, buffered from Hazel Grove and Bramhall by the planning restrictions of the North Cheshire Green Belt. To the south of the town are two business parks but here and to the east it is rural in nature, bounding on the former deer park of Lyme Hall. This is green belt.[13] The A6 trunk road passes to the north of the parish, and the Macclesfield Canal runs north/south along the 155m contour to the east of the parish.

The town straddles the Red Rock Fault. Its 200 metres (660 ft) downthrow to the west brings the Permo-Triassic sandstones and mudstones of the Cheshire Plain up against the Millstone Grit and shales of the Peak District. To the immediate east of the fault are the coal measures of the Carboniferous period which, unlike those in the Lancashire Coalfield, are missing the top layers. Here we find outcrops of the Middle Coal Measures. Coal from these strata, particularly the Four Foot Mine (or seam), the Five Foot Mine and the Accommodation Mine was extracted in the nineteenth and early twentieth century.[4] The lower ground, including most of Poynton, is covered by glacial till left by the retreating ice sheet at the close of the last ice age.

Woodford Aerodrome, to the west of the parish is now owned by BAE Systems—a major employer in the area—and has a Met Office weather station used for regional weather forecasting. Woodford's weather station recorded a temperature of −17.6 °C (0.3 °F) on 8 January 2010, during the Winter of 2009-2010 in the United Kingdom.[14]

Transport

Narrowboats on the Macclesfield Canal in Higher Poynton

The Macclesfield Canal, a canal with only one flight of locks, was originally proposed in 1765. However it was not commenced until 1826. Completed in 1831, it joins the Peak Forest Canal in Marple with the Trent and Mersey Canal near Kidsgrove and forms a part of the Cheshire Ring. The route was chosen so it could pass close to the Poynton Colleries, in order to transport coal to Macclesfield for the steam engines and 5000 houses. It shortened the canal journey from Manchester to London by 25 miles and allowed easy carriage of coal to the cotton mills at Dukinfield.[15]

Poynton lies to the south of the A6. This was the favoured London to Manchester route in the late middle ages as it avoided the wetter land of the Cheshire Plain. This is shown in John Ogilby's road atlas of 1675. It was improved by the formation of a turnpike trust in 1724. In 1760, Sir George Warren, the Leghs of Adlington and James Pickford promoted a new turnpike road through Poynton with Worth from Hazel Grove to Sandon in Staffordshire on the A51 road. This provided a link to Macclesfield. It is now known as the A523, or locally as the London Road. Later the Chester Road, the A5149 provided a link to Wilmslow.[16]

In December 2011, the city reconstructed the intersection of Chester Road/Park Lane and London Road, creating the first "double roundel" for a high traffic intersection.[17] Similar to a roundabout, the new intersection reduces the four-lane approaches to two lanes, allowing pedestrians to cross quickly, and safely allowing the elimination of traffic signals. Multiple coloured and textured cobbles separate traffic from pedestrians areas, however it functions as a shared space, allowing pedestrians to cross anywhere that feels safe. According to the city, businesses have seen increased foot traffic, and congestion has been considerably lessened. The total cost was 4 million pounds, comparable to traditional road repairs which were needed.[18]

The Manchester and Birmingham Railway opened a line through Poynton in 1845 which today forms part of the London–Manchester main line. The station on this line, offers local services to Manchester and Macclesfield. The Macclesfield, Bollington and Marple Railway was opened in 1869, with stations at Higher Poynton and Middlewood. Since its closure in 1970, the line has been converted into a footpath and bridleway called the Middlewood Way.

Cheshire East Council is responsible for co-ordinating public transport. They run an Integrated Transport Service with Cheshire West and Chester Council, but at the Environment and Prosperity Scrutiny Committee of 25 November 2009 -[19] they agreed to investigate separating the services; this would commence in November 2010. Poynton with Worth parish council was one of the Cheshire parishes that were part of Selnec PTE created by Transport Act 1968 but was not included in Greater Manchester when it was formed on 1 April 1974 as a result of the Local Government Act 1972.[20] As a result special ticketing arrangements are in place within the parish.

Poynton railway station on the West Coast Main Line is served by an hourly off-peak rail service to Stoke-On-Trent and Manchester Picadilly Monday-Saturday, with extra trains at peak times (Mon-Fri). Sunday services consist of 5 trains in each direction from Sunday 1 April 2012.

Current bus services :

P1 Hazel Grove Argyle Street - Poynton - Middlewood via Railway Stations (Monday - Saturday hourly) - Operated by Vale Travel
392 Stockport - Macclesfield via Bollington (Monday - Saturday daytime hourly) - Operated by High Peak
393 Stockport - Macclesfield via Adlington (Monday - Saturday Mornings and Late Afternoon only) - Operated by High Peak

Greater Manchester System One Travelcards are valid on all of the above bus services within Middlewood and Poynton. Weekly, Monthly and Annual Bus Saver and Countycard products can be purchased from the CO-OP or Asda. System One Day Saver tickets are available to buy onboard High Peak and Vale Travel services.

The local aerodrome Woodford Aerodrome lies partially within the parish, but for passenger flights Manchester International Airport is used.

Culture and community

Poynton Community Centre

Poynton Co-op was founded in 1862, staying independent until February 1992. There were many Friendly Societies, Burial Clubs, Workmen's Club[21] and the Miners' Union. The Methodist Chapel was established in 1847 followed by the Baptists and Primitive Methodists chapels; together with St George's Church they were the social centres of the village. Lord Vernon opened the first school in 1838 which was extended as the number of children attending it grew, and this building is used today as the Poynton Youth and Community Centre.

The Poynton Show,[22] is held every August bank holiday weekend. It started in 1885, as an agricultural show, and has grown in size, 35,000 people visited the show in 1970. It offers a full range of events in the main arena such as stunt riding and aerobatics, a fairground, exhibitions and competitive events.

The St George's Singers, is large choral society founded in 1956. Its current president is Dame Joan Bakewell. The choir has strong links with the Royal Northern College of Music and Chetham's School of Music. It has sung in Helsinki, Tallinn, Krakov, Budapest and Érd; more locally the choir's Singing Day attracts over 200 singers to learn and perform choral music.[23]

Poynton is also home to one of the North-West's premiere brass bands. The Vernon Building Society (Poynton) Brass Band [24] as it is now known, first started within the Poynton coal mining community and was supported by the mine owners, the Vernon family. It is not known for certain when the band began, but records from 1832 stating that new uniforms had been purchased by Lady Vernon suggest that it has existed for well over 160 years. Delighting audiences throughout the year with original and entertaining concert programmes, the band is also a regular prize-winner at contests throughout the country.

There are two Anglican churches in Poynton, St. Martin's, High Poynton, and St. George's, which occupies a prominent position in the town centre. St. George's church dates from 1859 and is in the Victorian Gothic style; the steeple was added in 1884. These have active congregations: running services, youth groups and a children's group.

Landmarks

Poynton Pool

Sir George Warren bought the Worth estate in 1792. Worth Hall, originally the home of the Downes family of Worth, has now been redeveloped as flats and lies within the confines of Davenport Golf Club.

Several halls were built in Poynton Park, each one then demolished to make way for a new hall. The last hall, Poynton Towers, was finally taken down in the 1930s. The ornamental lake, known locally as Poynton Pool, was created in the 1760s by Sir George Warren who dammed a tributary of the Poynton Brook, as part of his landscaping of the Park. The dam itself served as the foundation for the turnpike.[16]

Poynton Coppice is a designated Local Nature Reserve [25]

  • St Georges Church
  • Park Colliery
  • Anson Pit

Education

The post box outside Poynton High School was painted gold in honour of ex-pupil Sarah Storey winning four gold medals at the 2012 Summer Olympics
See also: List of schools in Cheshire East

Education in Poynton is now run by Cheshire East Council; it was formerly run by Cheshire County Council. Due to the proximity to the border some parents choose to have their children educated in Stockport, or opt out and educate them privately.

Primary schools Vernon Infant School and Vernon Junior School were joined on 1 January 2008 to form the Vernon Primary School. Other schools in Poynton include:

Secondary school

References

  1. ^ 2001 census data
  2. ^ a b "A Topographical Dictionary of England, Samuel Lewis (ed.), 1848". Retrieved 2007-12-12.
  3. ^ Thornber, Craig. "Warren of Poynton and Stockport". Retrieved 10 January 2010.
  4. ^ a b c Kitching, David (2003). "Poynton Collieries: the Early Years". Retrieved 9 January 2010.
  5. ^ Industrial history of Poynton. Poyntonweb website. Retrieval Date: 25 September 2007.
  6. ^ Please note that in Cheshire and Lancashire, mine was a word meaning seam, a pit was a shaft and a collection of shafts was a colliery.
  7. ^ Kitching, David (2003). "Poynton Collieries: 1832–57 Development under the Vernons". Retrieved 9 January 2010.
  8. ^ Kitching, David (2003). "Poynton Collieries: Progress and Decline 1857–90 Years of change and progress". Retrieved 9 January 2010.
  9. ^ Kitching, David (2003). "Poynton Collieries: the Last Years". Retrieved 9 January 2010.
  10. ^ Youngs, F. A. (1991). Guide to the Local Administrative Units of England. Volume II: Northern England. London: Royal Historical Society. ISBN 0-86193-127-0
  11. ^ http://www.cheshireeast.gov.uk/council_and_democracy/local_democracy/town_and_parish_councils.aspx
  12. ^ http://www.cheshireeast.gov.uk/your_council.aspx
  13. ^ a b Electoral Commission Proposals for 2011
  14. ^ "Icy conditions hit the UK after days of heavy snow", BBC News, news.bbc.co.uk, 2010-01-07, retrieved 2010-01-07
  15. ^ Cousins, Graham (2002). "Macclesfield Canal proposals, 1765–1824". Railway & Canal Historical Society. Retrieved 13 January 2010.
  16. ^ a b Kitching, David (2003). "Road and Canal Transport and Traffic: Pickfords, a Local Carrying Firm". Retrieved 9 January 2010.
  17. ^ Goodyear, Sarah. "Lots of Cars and Trucks, No Traffic Signs or Lights: Chaos or Calm?", The Atlantic Cites. Apr 02, 2013. Accessed Apr 03, 2013.
  18. ^ Cassini, Martin, "Poynton Regenerated", Maniac Films in conjuction with the Poynton City Council. Published January 31, 2013. Accessed February 6, 2013.
  19. ^ http://moderngov.cheshireeast.gov.uk/ecminutes/ieIssueDetails.asp?IId=9347&PlanId=0&Opt=3#AI6771
  20. ^ Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. "Local Government Finance Statistics England No.16". local.odpm.gov.uk.
  21. ^ Poynton Workmen's Club Website. Retrieval Date: 2010-07-03.
  22. ^ Poynton Show website. Retrieval Date: 2010-01-09.
  23. ^ St George's Singers website. Retrieval Date: 2010-01-09.
  24. ^ Vernon Building Society (Poynton) Brass Band Retrieval Date: 2010-06-17.
  25. ^ "Poynton Coppice Local Nature Reserve". East Cheshire Council. Retrieved 28 January 2011.

Bibliography

  • Shercliff, W.H. (1983.). Poynton A Coalmining Village; social history, transport and industry 1700–1939. W.H.Shercliff. ISBN 0-9508761-0-0. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
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