page_title: A5103 road
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: A5103 road / History
caption_attribution_description: ...and the Beetham Tower&#160;;)
context_page_description: The A5103 is a major road in England. It runs from Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester city centre to junction 3 of the M56 motorway and is one of Manchester's principal radial routes.
context_section_description: The original scheme for a new road through the rural area south of Manchester was the design of the urban planner Richard Barry Parker, who envisaged the creation of a parkway — a broad, landscaped highway — to run from the new garden suburb of Wythenshawe, connecting it with Manchester City Centre. Manchester Corporation  began construction of the new Princess Parkway in 1929 with a new bridge over the River Mersey. The new road was laid out as a dual carriageway for motor vehicles with a segregated tram track along the central reservation for Manchester Corporation Tramways to run trams into Manchester City Centre.
  Princess Road/Princess Parkway was one of two new arterial roads into Manchester built by Manchester Corporation; the other was Kingsway, a few miles to the east, also built as a dual carriageway with reserved tram tracks along the middle. This layout was known as the 'Brodie' system, a new approach to road design that had been pioneered in Liverpool by John Alexander Brodie. The first tracks were laid out in the 1920s, terminating at Southern Cemetery; Manchester Corporation Transport planned to extend the tracks to Northenden and Wythenshawe, but following a change in transport policy in 1930, the Corporation invested in bus services instead. Manchester Corporation Tramways eventually ceased operation in 1949 and the tram tracks were removed.
  Parker's scenic Parkway route, running south from Barlow Moor Road to Altrincham Road, was noted for its landscaped verges and rose beds. In its 1945 plan, Manchester Corporation proposed extending the road northwards into the city centre and south through Ollerton and Toft, creating a major traffic route into the city. In 1969, work began to upgrade Princess Parkway to motorway standards, in order to feed into the M56 motorway. To enable this work, Parker's landscaping was removed, with 50,000 trees and shrubs being uprooted, and pedestrian footbridges were installed, and an old country house, Kenworthy Hall, was demolished.
  In 1997, the Hulme Arch Bridge designed by Chris Wilkinson Architects and Arup was installed over Princess Road in the Hulme area.
caption: The Hulme Arch Bridge over Princess Road
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