|
Heaton Park is a municipal park in Manchester, England, covering an area of over ,〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Heaton Hall )〕, which makes it the largest municipal park in Europe 〔http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/4311655.stm〕. The park includes the grounds of a Grade I listed, neoclassical 18th century country house, Heaton Hall. The hall, remodelled by James Wyatt in 1772, is now only open to the public on an occasional basis as a museum and events venue.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Bury Council - Heaton Park )〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】Budget crisis could lead Manchester council to give away Heaton Hall and Wythenshawe Hall )〕 Heaton Park was sold to Manchester City Council in 1902, by the Earl of Wilton. It has one of the United Kingdom's few concrete towers, the Heaton Park BT Tower. The park was renovated as part of a millennium project partnership between the Heritage Lottery Fund and Manchester City Council at a cost of over £10 million.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Latest news )〕〔〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=HELM Home Page )〕 It contains an 18-hole golf course, tennis courts, a boating lake, an animal farm, a pitch and putt course, a golf driving range, woodlands, ornamental gardens, an observatory, an adventure playground, a Papal Monument and a volunteer-run tram system and museum and is listed Grade II by Historic England.〔() 〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/Details/Default.aspx?id=388172 )〕 It has the only flat green bowling greens in Manchester, built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games. ==History== Heaton Hall had been owned by the Holland family since the Middle Ages. In 1684, when Sir John Egerton, 3rd Baronet of Wilton married Elizabeth Holland, the hall came to the Egerton family.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Heaton Park : History & Architecture )〕 In 1772, Sir Thomas Egerton, 7th Baronet (later the 1st Earl of Wilton) commissioned the fashionable architect James Wyatt, to design a new home for his young family. Although Wyatt had already established a reputation for himself as an innovative architect, he was only 26 years old and Heaton Hall was his first country house commission.〔() 〕 Wyatt's neo-classical masterpiece was built in phases and was mostly completed by 1789. The park was originally laid out by William Emes in the style of Capability Brown.〔 It has long been used for public events such as Heaton Park races which were established by the second Earl in 1827. The races were run on a course on the site of the present day boating lake until 1839 when they moved to Aintree near Liverpool, now the venue for the Grand National.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Heaton Park : The Earls of Wilton )〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Bury tourist and visitor information - tourUK.co.uk )〕 During the 19th century when the railway to Bury was being laid, it stopped short of Heaton Park, as Lord Wilton was not prepared to see his estate disfigured by a railway.〔() 〕 As a compromise the line was run under the estate in a tunnel and a railway station opened adjacent to the Whittaker Lane/Bury Old Road entrance in 1879 (now Heaton Park Metrolink station). Consequently, the decision by Lord Wilton to put the hall and park up for sale was greeted with dismay, especially when it became known that the site was being eyed by a property developer. A pressure group was formed to persuade Manchester City Council to purchase it as a museum and municipal park. Alderman Fletcher Moss, a prominent antiquarian was a notable influence in this movement. The park was purchased and opened to the public in 1902. Unfortunately, the council was not prepared to purchase the contents of the hall and so the furniture and paintings were sold by auction. The hall was considered by the council to be of little architectural or historical significance, and the saloon was initially used as a tea-room.〔() 〕 The city council used the hall as a branch art gallery for many years, but eventually the architectural and historical importance of the building was realised. A major restoration programme brought the state rooms back to their original appearance, and period furniture was obtained to furnish them.〔 Some of the original pieces were recovered from store or purchased at sales. Unfortunately, the exterior of the hall is still in a bad state of repair with crumbling stucco, peeling paintwork and boarded-up windows. It is hoped that this will eventually be rectified with further grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The Manchester Pals used the park as a training depot during the First World War, and several hutted camps were built. The park was also used as the site of a Royal Air Force depot in the Second World War. Manchester Council later used part of the north side of the park for the construction of a large gravity feed reservoir, employing a contractor's railway from Whitefield railway station. This work was interrupted by the First World War, and only completed in the 1920s. A municipal golf course was also laid out, and a large boating lake excavated. The former facade of the first Manchester Town Hall on King Street was re-erected as a backdrop to the lake. During the Second World War, two "prefab" housing estates and an infants school were built in the south of the park, the houses providing much-needed homes until they were demolished in the 1960s.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Heaton Park : The 20th Century )〕 The school building was used by Manchester City Council until 2012, when it was demolished. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Heaton Park」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|