St Philips Marsh, Bristol
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St Philip's Marsh is an industrial inner suburb of
Bristol Bristol () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, the most populous city in the region. Built around the River Avon, Bristol, River Avon, it is bordered by t ...
,
England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
. It is bounded by River Avon and Harbour feeder canal making it an almost island area, unlike the other two areas surrounded by water, it was historically part of Gloucestershire and is part of North Bristol. The site is home of Avonmeads Retail Park, a large retail and leisure park with
Showcase Cinemas Showcase Cinemas is a movie theater chain owned and operated by National Amusements. It operates in the United States, Brazil (under the UCI Cinemas brand), the United Kingdom, and Argentina. Operations Showcase operates a total of 16 theate ...
and a Hollywood Bowl
ten-pin bowling Tenpin bowling is a type of bowling in which a bowler bowling form, rolls a bowling ball down a wood or synthetic lane toward ten pins positioned Tetractys, evenly in four rows in an equilateral triangle. The goal is to knock down all ten Bowlin ...
centre among its tenants. It was extensively redeveloped in the 15 years to 2007. A bypass runs over the River Avon creating a major transport link from the A4 road in south east Bristol, to junction 3 of the
M32 motorway The M32 is a motorway in South Gloucestershire and Bristol, England. It provides a link from the M4, a major motorway linking London and South Wales, to Bristol city centre and is maintained by National Highways, the national roads body. Th ...
near the city centre. In past years St Philip's Marsh was a housing development for the workers of Bristol's market area (now known as Old Market). One of St Philip's' more influential residents during the early 1900s was George Townsend, a major property developer of the South Bristol area. His family home situated in the St Anne's area of Bristol is still standing today and a reminder of Bristol's history. Today there is very little housing in the area making it almost deserted at night, and other than the retail area it does contain one shop, pub, takeaway and Sparke Evans Park. St Davids Welsh Anglican Church was sited on Feeder Road until demolition in 1922. Other churches in the area include St Silas (also Feeder Road) which was damaged during the Bristol Blitz.


Geology

The solid geology of St Philip's Marsh comprises
Triassic The Triassic ( ; sometimes symbolized 🝈) is a geologic period and system which spans 50.5 million years from the end of the Permian Period 251.902 million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Jurassic Period 201.4 Mya. The Triassic is t ...
Redcliffe
Sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...
in the east, and Triassic
mudstone Mudstone, a type of mudrock, is a fine-grained sedimentary rock whose original constituents were clays or muds. Mudstone is distinguished from ''shale'' by its lack of fissility.Blatt, H., and R.J. Tracy, 1996, ''Petrology.'' New York, New York, ...
and halite-stone of the
Mercia Mudstone Group The Mercia Mudstone Group is an early Triassic lithostratigraphy, lithostratigraphic group (stratigraphy), group (a sequence of rock strata) which is widespread in Britain, especially in the English Midlands—the name is derived from the ancient ...
to the west. The solid geology is overlain by
Quaternary The Quaternary ( ) is the current and most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS), as well as the current and most recent of the twelve periods of the ...
Tidal Flat Deposits of
silt Silt is granular material of a size between sand and clay and composed mostly of broken grains of quartz. Silt may occur as a soil (often mixed with sand or clay) or as sediment mixed in suspension (chemistry), suspension with water. Silt usually ...
and
clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolinite, ). Most pure clay minerals are white or light-coloured, but natural clays show a variety of colours from impuriti ...
, which are in turn covered by deep deposits of made ground.


Sparke Evans Park

Sparke Evans Park is situated on the riverside not far from the retail park. The land was donated by P.F. Sparke Evans and Jonathan Evans, local tannery owners, in 1902. It is a survivor from a time when the Marsh was a residential area. Since the area has become almost totally industrial it now gets little use, what use it does get is by workers on breaks and from the residents of Arno's Vale and
Totterdown Totterdown is an inner-suburb of Bristol, England, situated just south of the River Avon and to the south-east of Temple Meads railway station and the city centre. It rises relatively steeply from the river bank to a largely terraced Victorian ...
as there is a bridge linking the two areas. A shelter dating from 1925 is still extant on the far west of the park featuring wrought-iron pillars, with ornate and decorative brackets.


Railways

St Philip's Marsh is located close to
Bristol Temple Meads railway station Bristol Temple Meads is the oldest and largest railway station in Bristol, England. It is located away from London Paddington. It is an important transport hub for public transport in the city; there are bus services to many parts of the city ...
, on the
Great Western Main Line The Great Western Main Line (GWML) is a main line railway in England that runs between London Paddington and . It connects to other main lines such as those from Reading to Penzance and Swindon to Swansea. The GWML is presently a part of t ...
.
St Philip's Marsh depot St Philip's Marsh depot is a railway depot located in the St Philip's Marsh district of Bristol, England. It was established as a steam locomotive shed in 1910 but this facility closed in the 1960s. A new diesel facility opened nearby at Marsh ...
is a train maintenance depot located within the district. Originally developed by the
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...
as a twin-turntable facility for freight locomotives, it was closed to steam in June 1964 and redeveloped as a diesel depot. Owned by
Network Rail Network Rail Limited is the owner (via its subsidiary Network Rail Infrastructure Limited, which was known as Railtrack plc before 2002) and railway infrastructure manager, infrastructure manager of most of the railway network in Great Britain. ...
under depot code PM, it is leased to train operator
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...
, and has been used since their introduction for the maintenance of
InterCity 125 The InterCity 125 (originally Inter-City 125) or High Speed Train (HST) is a diesel-powered High-speed rail, high-speed passenger train built by British Rail Engineering Limited between 1975 and 1982. A total of 95 sets were produced, each com ...
trains operating between London Paddington, Bristol and
South Wales South Wales ( ) is a Regions of Wales, loosely defined region of Wales bordered by England to the east and mid Wales to the north. Generally considered to include the Historic counties of Wales, historic counties of Glamorgan and Monmouthshire ( ...
. Both Class 43 power cars and Mark 3 coaching stock are serviced here. Following the merger of
First Great Western First Greater Western, trading as Great Western Railway (GWR), is a British train operating company owned by FirstGroup that provides services in the Greater Western franchise area. It manages 197 stations and its trains call at over 270. GWR ...
(FGW) and
Wessex Trains Wessex Trains was a train operating company in the United Kingdom owned by National Express that operated the Wessex Trains franchise from October 2001 until March 2006, when the franchise was merged with the Great Western and Thames Trains ...
operations into one new franchise in 2006, St Philip's Marsh took over the maintenance of FGW's fleet of diesel multiple units, previously maintained at
Cardiff Canton TMD Cardiff Canton TMD is a diesel locomotive traction maintenance depot in Cardiff, Wales. Its depot code is CF. It is operated by Transport for Wales. The depot is used by Transport for Wales fleet, GWR Class 158s and some Cross Country Class 170 ...
by
Arriva Trains Wales Arriva Trains Wales (ATW; ) was a British train operating company owned by Arriva UK Trains that operated the Wales & Borders franchise. It ran urban and inter-urban passenger services to all railway stations in Wales, including , , , , and , ...
. The move allowed the removal of the need for the majority of trains operating area, mostly in the
West Country The West Country is a loosely defined area within southwest England, usually taken to include the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Somerset and Bristol, with some considering it to extend to all or parts of Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and ...
, requiring to travel through the congested
Severn Tunnel The Severn Tunnel () is a railway tunnel in the United Kingdom, linking South Gloucestershire in the west of England to Monmouthshire in south Wales under the estuary of the River Severn. It was constructed by the Great Western Railway (GWR) be ...
.


References


External links


Map of St Philip's Marsh circa 1900
* A
overhead view
of St Philip's Marsh T&RSMD. {{Areas of Bristol Areas of Bristol