Manchester

Introduction

Manchester

© S_Deisler

Nowhere in England is the contrast of Victorian Industrial past and affluent modern present clearer than in Manchester. Cotton mills and canals sit alongside the shiny complexes of multinational business, restaurants and bars. Manchester is a thriving centre for culture and music, it boasts a multitude of music venues, museums and shops. With it's feet in an impressive musical history Manchester is home to New Order, The Smiths, Oasis, The Verve, Spiral carpets, Mr Scruff, Lamb, Elbow and the scene that grew up around the Hacienda among a million others including the bubbling and very current music scene. Manchester is the not to be missed, laid back and cool capital of the north.

Terminology
For a brief period in the later 20th century there was a Metropolitan County Council for Greater Manchester. The City of Manchester was the largest of the Metropolitan Districts in this area. All these are now unitary authorities and the City of Manchester has no local government control over the others. However it is quite common to find the term 'Manchester' used to cover some areas outside of the city - such as Salford and Trafford in this article.

Neighbourhoods

Manchester is composed of many districts. Those of the most noteworthy:

• City centre
• Rusholme (for the famous curry mile)

South

• Fallowfield (student accommodation campus).
• Withington
• Chorlton-cum-Hardy
• Old Trafford
• East and West Didsbury

West

• Salford and Salford Quays

Sights and Activities

Museums and exhibition centres

• The Lowry Centre is an intriguing complex containing a collection of Lowry's paintings as well as two theatres.
• Manchester Museum has had a wide variety of collections and exhibitions, including a large collection of Egyptian artefacts. The museum is in the University area.
• Whitworth Art Gallery is award winning and recently refurbished.
• The Urbis hosts various exhibitions and events.
• Imperial War museum North (Salford quays) is a small but well put together museum with a viewing tower to look out over the quays.

Music and clubs

Manchester boasts a thriving club scene as well as many fantastic venues for live music. Indie and Rock as well as dance are all the main big time players in Manchester and you will never be short of somewhere to go.

Smaller venues for live music include:

• Night and Day cafe
• The Dry Bar (Northern Quarter)
• Thirsty Scholar and the attic
• Jabez Clegg

Larger venues:

• Manchester Evening News Arena
• The Apollo
• Manchester Academies

Night clubs

Many and varied! For more main stream evenings try the Deansgate and Printwork areas of the city centre.
South has a reputation for a crackin Indie friday night.
The warehouse project and Sankeys both run notorious dance nights. For student type evenings with Indie/rock you won't find better than 42nd Street or 5th Avenue.

Theatre, Dance and Classical music

• Library Theatre (St Peters Square)
• Royal Northern College of Music
• Palace Theatre
• Bridgewater Hall
• Lowry theatre

See the Theatre calender for what's on.

Other main attractions

• Manchester Town Hall is the most imposing town hall in Britain.
• Old Trafford is home of Manchester United.
• The city centre is a World Heritage area covering the cotton mills and canals.
• John Rylands Library is a recently restored beautiful Victorian Gothic library.

Weather

As with anywhere in Northern England, don't be surprised if there's a little rain. Summers are around 20 °C lasting from June to early September. Winters are mild with occasional frost or snow possible during the December to February period.

Getting There

By Plane

Manchester Airport (MAN), located about 14 kilometres from the centre of Manchester, is well served, including many intercontinental routes. Quite a few budget airlines use Manchester Airport as well.
Some of the main destinations served include Ljubljana, Cork, Dublin, Paris, Antwerp, Malta, Toronto, Chicago, New York, Cyprus, Tenerife, London, Lyon, Edinburgh, Amsterdam, Belfast, Geneva, Mallorca, Brussels, Gothenburg, Prague, Atlanta, Copenhagen, Corfu, Crete, Helsinki, Marrakech, Munich, Zürich, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Milan, Glasgow, Düsseldorf, Reykjavik, Budapest, Dubrovnik, Rome, Venice, Cancun, Orlando, Luxor, Mombasa, Doha, Karachi, Oslo, Stockholm, Riyadh, Singapore, Istanbul, Philadelphia, Athens, Barbados, Las Vegas and dozens of destinations around the Mediterranean.

Major carriers that fly to Manchester include:

• Air Canada from Toronto;
• Cathay Pacific from Hong Kong;
• Lufthansa from Frankfurt;
• Oman Air from Muscat;
• United Airlines from Chicago.

To/from the airport

• Rail: Manchester Airport railway station is located between Terminals 1 and 2. It is linked to the terminals using a Skylink moving walkway. Trains are operated either by Northern Rail or TransPennine Express and connect the airport to Manchester Piccadilly Station and other railway stations mainly throughout northern England, although some trains even go to Edinburgh in Scotland.
• Bus: Buses serve many locations throughout Greater Manchester, including the 24-hour bus service Skyline which runs every 10 minutes or so (every 30 minutes at night) to Manchester city centre. There is also Skyline operating every hour to Altrincham via Wythenshawe and Sale. National Express has buses to places further away, even to Dublin.
• Car: The airport is a 20-minute drive from Manchester city centre and is reached by the M56 motorway, with a dedicated approach road from the motorway at junction 5. There are many parking places at the airport, and rental cars and taxis are all widely available.

By Train

Trains in and out of Manchester run frequently. There are three main city centre stations, Picadilly for main access, entry straight to the city centre, Victoria also in the centre and Oxford road which is closest for University access.
See National Rail for more information about schedules and prices.

By Car

Manchester has an outer ring road the M60 which is heavily congested at rush hour (4:00-6:00pm) but is useful for quick access. From the South use the M6 or M6 toll. From Leeds M62.

Driving into the centre is tricky and it is advisable to use the frequent and reliable bus services available. There are 'Park and Ride services' around the city. Check the TFGM Busses website for more information.

By Bus

Direct services to London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, Birmingham and many other destinations are available with National Express and Megabus

Getting Around

By Public Transport

Manchester Piccadilly is the main station, with regular links to Manchester Airport. Manchester Victoria is the second biggest station, serving mainly local routes.

The Metrolink, the light rail system in Manchester, runs from Bury in the North right through to Altrincham in the South, passing through the city centre and Manchester Piccadilly. There is also a line running to Eccles from the city centre. Services on the Bury and Altrincham lines run from around 6:00am to 12:30am weekdays and to around 1:00am at weekends.

The free Metroshuttle bus leaves Manchester Piccadilly every few minutes and takes a route through the city centre and past the other major railway stations and tram stops along the way.

By Foot

The city centre is compact enough to access most places on foot.

Eat

• The Eighth Day is a long running vegetarian restaurant, it also has a health food store attached. On Oxford Road, near to the University Area.
• San Carlo is an atmospheric Italian restaurant serving delicious food. On King Street West, off Deansgate.
• Rice is an Asian fast food outlet in Piccadilly Gardens- quick and tasty, eat in or takeaway.
• Arndale Market is the recently re-located and rejuvenated, the new market contains a range of delicious and reasonably priced eating options including sushi, Chinese, Italian, fresh soups and Indian.

For the best curries, head to Curry Mile, a short taxi ride or bus journey to Rusholme, just out of the centre.
Numerous options for Indian, Pakistani, Sri Lankan and Bangladeshi cuisine.

Drink

• Sinclair's Oyster Bar is in Shambles Square, one of the cheapest places in the city to get a pint.
• Rodeo is a tiny little bar specialising in cocktails, in the trendy Northern Quarter.
• Odd Bar is a cool and quirky little bar, also in the Northern Quarter.
• Matt and Phred's is a Live Jazz Club, on Tib Street.

Sleep

Learn

• Manchester University

Keep Connected

Internet

Internet cafés can be found in many cities and towns. All UK public libraries provide access, often branded as "People's Network", usually at no or little charge, though there is usually a time limit. Some hotels/hostels also offer internet access, including wifi, but most times at a cost. Using the internet on your personal phone can become expensive very quickly, with carriers charging 100's of times the local rate for data. To avoid these expensive roaming charges, you can hunt for wifi at a local cafe or hotel, or rent a mobile hotspot via several providers including DATAPiXY, and XCOM Global.

Phone

See also: International Telephone Calls

The country calling code to the United Kingdom is: 44. To make an international call from the United Kingdom, the code is: 00

In case of emergency, call 999 or 112 from any phone. Such calls are free and will be answered by an emergency services operator who will ask you for your location, and the service(s) you need (police, fire, ambulance, coastguard or mountain rescue). You can call this number from any mobile telephone as well, even if you do not have roaming.

Although the number is declining, you can still find payphones in many public areas, especially stations, airports etc. You can usually pay with cash and sometimes by creditcard or, for international calls, special phonecards are still available.

Mobile phones are heavily used. The main networks are T-Mobile, Vodafone, Orange and O2. 3G data services are available, usually priced per megabyte and coverage is usually very good in the UK, however it may lack in rural areas. Roaming on your personal phone plan can be expensive. To manage costs, consider purchasing a local UK SIM card for your phone. Several companies offer local SIM cards including Telestial, and CellularAbroad.

Post

The Royal Mail provides postal services in the United Kingdom. The Royal Mail's store fronts are called Post Office and offer services ranging from sending letters and packages to foreign currency exchange. Use the branch locator to find the nearest Post Office branch. There will be at least one post office in any town/city and there are quite often post offices in larger villages. It's common for a post office to be incorporated into a grocery store, where there will be a small counter located at the back of the store for dealing with post related matters. All post offices are marked with signs that say 'post office' in red lettering. Post boxes can be found at any post office and standalone large red post boxes on the streets or red boxes in the sides of public buildings.
For sending packages overseas, it might be a good idea to check prices and services with international companies like TNT, UPS or DHL.

External Links

• Official Website
• Official Tourism Website