The Knowhere Guide

Best and Worst in Liverpool, Merseyside*

Liverpool, Merseyside Triumphs and Tragedies

Favourite Building

• The Ice Rink - well, until some fool demolished it!
• The Anglican Cathedral - gothic brilliance! The view of the waterfront as seen from a ferry on way back from Ireland... bloomin gorgeous!
• the swan pub
• India building - imposing, grand, imperial, official and absolutely fab.
• Goodison Park. Ugly, old and situated in a poor area. But its my church. Other than that, The Museum, Art Gallery, JMU's old Great Western Hotel building and St. Georges Hall all deserve this accolade equally.
• St Lukes bombed out church on Hardman Street though Liverpool has ridiculously varied architecture.
• The Grand Central building on Renshaw street its art nouveau you know!!!
• The Triad, Bootle
• Lamb bananna
• Merchant Taylors' Boys school, Crosby, at night - beautiful.
• Calderstones School. Although it has been modernised (badly)the main Quarry building is beautiful and,hey,John Lennon went to school there. Worth a look as it is also within walking distance of Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane.
• The Liver Buildings the first building in the world made fron steel Girders
• Speke Airport Terminal Building (Not Liverpool Airport) - Superb example of 1930s architecture. Now being restored and turned in to a Hotel. Superb.
• The Mersey Tunnel building at Pier Head. (Looks like a gigantic Egyptian Chimney). The old ABC cinema behind Wetherspoons.
• Liverpool has the greatest neo-classical architecture outside of Italy. Check out St George's Hall, the Walker Art Gallery, Central Library, the Planetarium, Liverpool Museum. Also the Bluecoat Chambers, the Cathedrals (opinion is divided), the Philharmonic Hall, countless pubs, hotels, etc.
• Has to be St. Georges Hall
• all of the waterfront
• The glasshouse in Sefton Park, renovated or not...
• St.Georges Hall, descibed by a famous architect as "The world's finest building", and by Queen Victoria as "worthy of ancient Athens".
• Too many to mention - largest number of listed buildings in a city outside of London
• Classical Library and Art gallery buildings in the city centre.
• Paddy's Wigwam - The Catholic Cathedral or possibly the Tower restaurant. Nothing as boring as The Liver Buildings

Demolish It Now Building

• Municipal Buildings
• most of Park road- looks messy as hell. Oh, and that debarcle of a metal structure in Whitchapel, that used to be a post offcie and is a kinda nothing at the moment, looks awful!
• goodison and kings dock in 2005
• the arena bar, ick
• monstrosity barratt building on the corner of canning and catherine street, whoever bribed the town planners should be courtmarshalled
• All of kensington
• Metropolitan cathedral
• Other than Sham-Field, the area of Kensington and all the 1960's designed concrete/glass monstrosities, probably those nasty little shops on the front of Lime Street Station.
• Anfield. Stinks of p*ss. Say no more.
• Clayton Square shopping centre
• All the old JMU buildings
• St Johns Precinct. Its horrible!
• The Crowne Plaza- it sucks
• king david high school
• L2
• High-rises.
• St John's shopping centre. The council has vague plans to do away with it and put a conference centre there. Please do!
• The Customs & Excise Building (Not just because it is)known in liverpool as "The VATican"
• All of the many multi-storey car parks.
• High-rise flats.
• The Liverpool Echo building on the Waterfront, destroys one of the best views in Britain
• The Atlantic Towers hotel should have been demolished before it was built- it's dark & creepy..and the lifts never work!
• Liverpool city council tax office in victoria street, preferably with the staff still inside.
• The new Lamb-Banana sculpture outside the Port of Liverpool Building - not a building as such but I hate it so much I thought I'd mention it...
• The Echo Building - yuk!

The Best Things

• You can fly to virtually anywhere, from Speke.
• Scantily clad scouse girls with the largest breasts I've ever seen and all seem to use the acronym G.F.I. (gaggin' for it!).
• Awesome walls climbing place down by the Stanley dock market
• The humour, the chip shops, the atmosphere, Otterspool for flying kites, The jukebox in 'The Swan', The people, the loyalty of its ex-pats and how we all pretty darned freindly! ( apart from the scallis, but doesnt every city have them ?)
• The Shops Radio Merseyside.
• the way they had a go at thatcher
• Qiuggins!!!!! LOVE that place!!!
• the swan, the 'noize bleed' vandalism
• u can jus go there an smoke pot an play guitar an eat at SAYERS its so good for the munchies
• kimos, caledonian, magnet, everyman
• Liverpool FC
• The Beatles - the single greatest contribution to 20th century music.
• The suprising levels of culture. The nightlife - nowhere is better. The people, the history and the plans for the future. If we pull these off Liverpool will be back as one of the UK's premier cities. Scousers will go out of their way to do complete strangers a favour. The cultural mix. The students - breathing new life into Liverpool. The passionate football culture (we are not a bunch of thugs red or blue).
• The roads out, southerners.
• It's lively and rarely boring.
• Bold Street. Its like a boss little microcosm of a city.
• Liverpool is unique. Its like no-where else in the country, let alone the world. It's not really a nothern town . It is NOT an industrial city as many imagine, but a commercial one, it shares absolutely nothing in common with say Sheffield or Oldham. It has its own identity like no other place I know.
• Stanley Road on a hot, sticky summers evening
• The Catholic (Metropolitan) Cathedral. The person who slagged it off as one of the worst things has obviously never been inside, it's beautiful. Amazing stained glass, and the place has a really relaxing, spiritual atmosphere. It's in the City Centre but you go in and it's completely silent. Check it out, it's a cathedral, anyone can go in to scope it out.
• The streets and nice and smooth well most of em anyway
• Scousers, without a doubt, are the best people in the world - every good thing you hear about them is probably true. Everything bad is unfortunately usually made up. Everything in the centre is so tightly packed - everything's within 2 minutes walk of everything else. Scouse wit and humour.
• Good skatespots, Lost Art is a damn cool shop.
• The architecture's superb, the nightlife is the best I've come across in the travels all over the UK, the people are friendly without ever being deferential in shops etc. like you get down south. It looks like after a long difficult period, Liverpool's economy is picking up with loads of lovely old buildings in the city centre coming back into use and big plans for new projects in the pipeline. Liverpool could finally be getting the success it deserves.
• Liverpool is Gods own country. Real scousers are the finest people on earth, scaally scousers are scum and shoud be put down. But the media home in on these people and it gives us all a bad name. Why not shun all papers not just the ***
• The students give the area vitality and make sure you can have lots of mates with a wide range of backgrounds and opinions.The Krazy House as it is like a second home to me & my mates.
• St Johns Beacon aka The Tower resturant (Know by locals as "The Chippy on a stick") has been taken over by the best local radio station "Magic 1548 & City FM" .. Hope they keep the Christmas sound to light shows going!
• Got to be the Humour, It's true what they say about Scousers there funny and very friendly people .. Me, I love em
• The best thing about Liverpool is the people - they're good fun...once you can understand the language...I'm a 'softy' southerner who spends a lot of time in Liverpool on Business; I love spending time there and feel safer there than I do in my home (one-horse) town. I also think Liverpool gets a bad press based on the way it may have been years ago. If you've never been try it! You'll be pleasantly surprised.
• Loadsa people which means loadsa mates!
• the warmth and genuine humour of a lot of scousers. cheap living up here!
• clubs clubs and more clubs
• The people, as long as you've got a sense of humour, the football and the daft vioce that everyone will put on as soon as you say "Ferry Cross The Mersey" (see The Scousers on Harry Enfield)
• Two good teams, Liverpool and Liverpool reserves.
• Lark Lane - Student heaven. Sefton Park on a sunny Sunday.
• The people, the sense of humour (desperation). Good buzz and cheap too!
• The Liverpool golfclub between Hoylake and West Kirby + Caldy golfclub which has a beautiful course.
• Empire. Great ballet and comediens.
• Playhouse Theatre. The audience is often full of Brookside starlets.
• The Albert Docks. Renovated dockland. Now shops, business and galleries (such as the Tate.)
• Only half an hours drive from Chester. One of the oldest Cities in the UK, and also one of the most beautiful. Parts of it are well over two thousand years old.
• Only a five minute drive from the Wirral. Parts of which are outstandingly beautiful.
• Three or four Universities.
• The view from the top of the Anglican Cathederal.
• The Anglican Cathederal. The tallest Cathederal in the world. Very gothic.
• Plenty of good theatre to be found in the Playhouse, Unity theatre and Everyman.
• Best = Most things are rad. The 11 steps at Moorfields (well, near enough).
• It's good for a laugh - atmosphere's good and it comes alive at night.

The Worst Things

• You can fly from virtually anywhere, to Speke.
• Scallies. Nuff said. Track suit wearing sheep who obvs have parents that cant control them and an island just off Birkenhead with them all on would be a bloomin good idea! Oh and the nit-wits who skit peiople for having long hair - oh how funny...not! and the kids who throw eggs at people. not big, not clever.
• Those bag-heads who stand behind you asking for money when you are trying to use the cash machines in the city centre.
• the people who give liverpool a bad name, e.g look at the 'stuff we cant fit anywhere else and you will find who im talking about
• gettin a taxi at the weekend, an the night buses
• gettin the train home i always get stuk in bidston
• students - they get in the way at the weekend the big issue challenge - how far you can make it across town without being hassled by aggressive big issue sellers when will the cale get a late licence? lingerie wearers at the weekend
• The reputation the fucken southeners and wooly backs give Liverpool. Yes it was a bit in trouble in the 80s but things have picked up. And another thing, why is it Liverpool's fault that Thatcher destroyed. So there. Also the lady at Liverpool Lime St station who announces the trains. She gets on my nerves
• Orange bastards/Nazis parading when hardly anyone in the city wants them.
• Kensington Thieving scally bastards - house done over twice in three months 10 y.o. scally shits hassling you on the way to kwik save - the shittest supermarket staffed by the most miserable cunts this side of Bradford. Being asked if you want any business luv ? on your way home.
• The reliance on the Beatles legend for ALMOST EVERYTHING - tourism, museums, Education (the Paul McCartney school!); The Cavern lends its name to a quarter of the city, two clubs and a shopping centre for chrissakes!
• The Scallies. But avoiding cornershops, dark streets/alleys and open park areas after dark means they dont bother you too much. BUT WHAT POSSESSES THEM TO DRESS LIKE THAT?!?! Oh, and the false media image - will we ever escape it?
• All the scousers and scallys
• Sometimes they get a bit too liveley and it's too smal, you can walk eveywhere which means avoiding people is a bit difficult.
• Big hoop earings or sovereigns. Lacoste tracksuits in hideous colours like vomit green and puss yellow. Skin like an urang utang from the sunbeds and fake tan. Moorfields staion where the escalators dont work and its like walking up the giants causeway. Oh and people from Seaforth (they smell).
• The whole city is so insular. Everybody is the same. Everybody has the same views on everything. Everybody looks the same. Everyone listens to the same radio station etc The only variation between other residents is the football team they support! and that is pretty sad. Its like living in a city of clones or robots. Liverpool is a city of absolute conformists, and with that it cannot progress forward.
• Bricks getting thrown at buses, and kids pulling the back doors off
• Bloody strikes. Its now January 2001 and we are in the third postal strike in the last 12 months. Greedy postmen are a pain in the arse. Sack the bloody lot of them. On strike this time cos a scouse postman got caught robbing mail. There's a novelty, eh. I think not!
• the scllys townies to some of u they are every were lookin for a fight well they have got one
• Skinhead priks who get their jollies making everyone miserable.
• Scallies in tracksuits who hang round in graveyards, street corners and the like. Always into the latest pop music release.
• The scallys, just stay near Pierhead and Law Courts and try to avoid trains or stay in large groups if travelling by train.
• THE SKATEBOARDER CHIEF !
• The students, however, do think they are the only people worth anything in the city. This pretention can make for a bit of an attitude towards locals.
• Mathew Street and it's night-time inhabitants.
• The Sun newspaper ..sadly still sold in some Liverpool shops though nowhere near the pre-Hillsborough circulation. "Hillsborough, Merseyside will never forget"
• People who say they don't like scousers but have never been to liverpool
• Market stall traders in Church Street
• Everton Park !! Be careful there otherwise you will be robbed by a bunch of 13 yr olds in a stolen car (speaking from experience) Otherwise nice place to live
• The police - they're all over the place telling you to stop skating allmost anywhere!
• our image to every none scouser
• Bad skinheaded Scallies......
• beer boys and girls who can't cope with clubs
• Jimmy Tarbuck
• The road to Manchester
• Outsiders image of the city. Death to the media.
• Scallys and Scousers who have never left Liverpool.
• The Catholic Cathederal. Contemporary insanity at its worst.
• The worst thing in Liverpool: the dickhead Skallies who will nick anything with wheels, so they can buy some Pot. Also they cause grief for no reason. (And they say we have no life!!!!)
• Worst = some bad attitudes.
• Parts of City Centre (Duke Street, London Road) very run down.

The Knowhere Guide started out as a list of places to skateboard in the UK. It is a compilation of (unedited) information and views supplied by users like yourself. It is not a conventional tourist guide!

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Credits

Last updated: 2008-05-17