Market History
Ellesmere Port Market has a fascinating history stretching back over 200 years
From the Port to the Port Arcades
Throughout its life, the market has moved location, continually moving south, along with its shopping centre as the town expanded; from open street markets on Grosvenor Street, Reform Street, Woodfield Road North and York Road, to a large indoor market in the 1980s and now to its current home next to the Port Arcades.
The town first came into existence as ‘The Port of Ellesmere’ which opened in the late 1790s, as the terminus of the Wirral Line Canal, which later became the Shropshire Union Canal in 1845, linking Ellesmere in Shropshire, some 31 miles away, to the River Mersey.
Later, much investment was put into the docks, particularly in the 1890s onwards coinciding with the opening of the Manchester Ship Canal at Ellesmere Port in 1891. Thereafter the town’s industrial base grew to include corrugated iron works from the early 1900s, oil refining at Stanlow which first opened as a bitumen works in 1920s and Vauxhall car production from 1962.
From street markets to a permanent home
To begin with Ellesmere Port’s population was very small. The first markets are thought to have been held in the early 1800s on waste ground at the ‘Bottom End’, now in the vicinity of the Waterways Museum and M53, where circuses and fairs were also held.
It was then operational as an open market at the northern end of Station Road until the 1920s when, it was moved to Reform Street, and it appears the Friday market was moved to the Railway Station forecourt, then to a patch of land near to the current Westminster Car Park, which was also used for the visiting fairground. In 1928 it was moved to the end of the Ellesmere Port Town FC football ground near York Road, and then as a six-day market nearby on York Road in 1951. Here, several permanent buildings selling fresh food and confectionery accompanied the canopy-covered stalls made of scaffolding with their plywood tops.
In the early 1970s, more than 50 years after it was initially proposed, a new Indoor Market was built by the side of the Lewis’s Hypermarket opening up onto Wellington Road. In 1984 the market was enlarged to double its size and refurbished.
Whilst the established stallholders continued to sell their meat, cheese and vegetables from the permanent stalls, the newer touring stallholders brought a wider range of wares including quality ‘seconds’ from a well-known High Street retailer and dressmaking fabrics. The Market became very popular and attracted many people from the surrounding area especially on Fridays – the traditional Ellesmere Port ‘market day’.
By 1989, Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays were the traditional market days with Mondays reserved for the Flea Market. Around the perimeter there were a number of lock-up shops while the central area was taken up with pitching stalls – in all, a total of 200 or so outlets and Sunday opening commenced in October 1994.
In the early 1990s, during the two weeks before Christmas, a special Sunday Market also took place where additional touring stallholders sold their wares selling a different range of wares for the Christmas shopper.
When the new Asda Superstore opened in 2006, the Market moved into the former Lewis’s building (which had been taken over by Asda in 1984) opening in January 2007, its current home.
Thanks to Ellesmere Port Local & Family History Society and Friends for their help in researching the market’s history.