Situated where we are we can’t hear the Oasis gig at all, as the concert is on the Bury Old Road side of the park.

Two of Kay’s cousins borrowed a small bit of our drive to park their car and went to the concert.

Their verdict? Fantastic!

Our verdict on the how everything seemed to work?

Traffic appeared to keep moving and there didn’t seem to be the horrific traffic jams we all expected.

There was an enormous amount of people walking around Middleton Road but the park and ride buses seemed to be working well.

Having said that the Middleton Road main gate wasn’t really the focus of foot or car traffic as most people were channeled out of the gig through the Bury Old road gates and the Sheep Foot Lane one.

I know the plan was that tram passengers should make their way to Bowker Vale to get their trams home. That is they wouldn’t be able to use the closer Heaton Park tram station, possibly because it’s smaller than Bowker Vale. All I can say is I hope Metrolink laid on special tram services with double carriages for everyone.

I suspect the traffic will be much more chaotic for the remaining Oasis dates at Heaton park if the weather continues nice, although the forecast is rather gloomy over the weekend: rain is expected.

Remember there are a vast raft of parking restrictions around the area. And as I said before the Heaton Park Sainsbury’s car park is closed to Oasis traffic and again the car park’s 8 foot high gates will close long before the gig finishes!

For those who want to see how the park is laid out check the Heaton Park map and note that there are now 2 further large gates for pedestrians to exit between the Grand Lodge entrance and the text saying Bury Old road on the left of the map at the bottom.

I live right outside Heaton Park where the Oasis concerts are being held.

Looking around the area my advice would be to use the park and ride facilities at Prestwich and elsewhere or to come by tram, arriving either at Heaton Park or Bowker Vale tram stations.

Otherwise it will be a complete nighmare for you. Traffic is fairly nose to tail with the quite small amount of rush hour traffic we normally get on Middleton Road. So you can imagine what it’s going to be like with a vast army of concert goers.

Basically the Middleton road and Sheepfoot Lane roads are completely coned off to prevent parking. And I know that Heaton Park has some parking inside but there’s no way it’s going to be able to meet the needs of the estimated 70,000 Oasis fans. And I suspect it may be all be used up by the buses that will be running into the park anyway.

And just in case you’re thinking of coming on the motorway and parking in the big car park at the Heaton Park Sainsbury’s there’s a notice warning for you not to go in as they’re closing the gates.

Also if you’re thinking of trying to go up Victoria Avenue it’s going to be blocked to concert traffic and all the way up the road is coned off.

Finally if you’re thinking of sneaking in and parking between cones or in a spot that looks vacant the police are operating a tow-away zone.

Obviously we don’t know whether it’s really going to be a nightmare but after years of living here and seeing the arrangements normally made for concerts these go way beyond what has been done before.

So like I said before make it easy on yourself and use public transport.

And then you can enjoy the show!

I left Manchester by train from Piccadilly station in the early morning yesterday.

I’d got the tram in from Bowker Vale (on the Bury line) and I’d seen thousands of Rangers supporters in Piccadilly Gardens, with at least one enormous screen, as I passed.

I arrived back at Piccadilly about 9pm to an enormous crowd of Rangers supporters milling around the station. It was great to see that despite losing the singing crowds behaved really well.

I made my way to the Metrolink station beneath the mainline station and noticed the tickets machines all had a label on saying out of order. Anyway, we all hung round waiting for the next tram.

Eventually a Metrolink loudspeaker message informed us we couldn’t use the tram from here. Instead we were told to get the tram from Victoria for Bury or G-Mex for Altrincham. Basically the tram system wasn’t operating over the Piccadilly Gardens no-go area.

Note to Metrolink: It would have been a lot more use if there’d been a notice so we didn’t even go down to the Metro station!

I was carrying a heavy but fragile box containing two wine glasses, a bottle of wine, home-made lemon curd, home-made mincemeat and a few other glass containers with goodies in. So I didn’t relish traipsing across to Victoria. Still it had to be done!

I went out into the warm night and set-off towards Piccadilly Gardens. The litter was amazing, there were bottles, broken bottles and mashed up newspaper, paper and other debris strewn all across the pavements. The bottle fragments crunched under foot as I walked through the vast hordes of Rangers fans to get a tram from Victoria.

I got to the Gardens and was turned away by a line of police with riot shields. They were being less than helpful to people who talked to them. That said, one or two fans were just being stupid and almost daring the police to have a go. As I turned to look back I noticed one Rangers fan who’d been next to me talking to the police get “tapped” on the head with a riot shield – I bet he’s got a headache this morning.

So I had to go the extremely long way round via Waternewton Street, past the old Post Office and then down past “The Band On The Wall” and the CIS building until I eventually walked into the urine drenched place we used to call Victoria station. The station was populated by another heaving, sweating army of Rangers supporters, who were quite noisy but well behaved. Once there I joined a queue of people buying Metrolink tickets who were all having the usual problem of not being able to pay with a note – despite using valid £5 notes, and having the Queen’s head uppermost and last and not being a new note. People kept trying note after note.

Note to Metrolink: Sort out the nightmare of the ticket machine – we should be able to use debit cards!

Finally I got me a ticket and got home. An hour and a half after arriving in Manchester – normally it takes me at the most 20 to 25 minutes.

And even thought the Rangers and Manchester United match was vitally important to both sets of fans the huge majority of fans behaved very well. As I wandered the streets I kept bumping into people with my heavy box and the fans were the first to apologise. Others made way for me and gave me space to stagger down to Victoria. Yet others kept me amused with comments to each other. All in all the majority of Rangers fans were a credit to football and their club.

And by the way, I saw Zenit St. Petersburg fans too and they were absolutely impeccably behaved.

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Sunday was a beautiful day for the historic re-opening of the horse drawn tram service in Heaton Park. There were large gatherings of tram fans and us, the general public, come to watch and take part in its first services.

I talked to Bob Hill (one of the restorers at the Tram Museum, his picture is to the left). Bob was pleased it was going so well and of course that the weather was much better than they’d had on Saturday. Saturday was their final trials and the heavens had opened and they’d all got soaked to their skins.

The tram turned out to be even more interesting than I thought. When it comes to the end of its journey it’s unhitched and the tram’s body literally turned round while the wheels remain on the tram track! You can see how that works from the 3 photos at the bottom of the post.

And the volunteers and enthusiasts had turned out in force to watch the tram go through its paces. I took two of my

daughters and bought a ticket from helpful conductor (David Hooker). David was nattily dressed as a Victorian, or maybe Edwardian (I think), ticket conductor in a natty bowler hat and stout shoes and full costume. He and the other volunteers who dressed the part were endlessly patient posing for many photos and selling lots of souvenir tickets for the trams first day.

We bought our tickets and hopped onto the tram and up to the upper deck. It was great! The tram doesn’t go that far but we all really enjoyed the experience. And with it the chance to be involved in a little history as the Heaton Park horse-drawn tram starts its service.

I’m not sure how the exact schedule for the trams will work as they’ve the horse drawn tram and their other trams. Although the only electric tram I could see was number 53. Which was working as it normally does on a Sunday during the season.

Anyway, good luck to Heaton Park, the Tram Museum and all involved with the trams. All I can say is, “get some more tram track laid down!” We all want to go up to Heaton Hall and maybe even across the park.

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