CAMBRIDGE INDUSTRIAL ESTATE, SALFORD, 5.58AM

Yesterday morning, I left my studio at 5.30am, and made my way up to the Cambridge industrial estate, which lies just beyond the banks of the River Irwell in Broughton. Above me was a glum sky, which only grudgingly allowed smears of cleaner blue through just before sunrise.

The birds were up early, forcefully calling their information songs out to each other through the rough branches of trees, left to hang wild over derelict land and dead end streets brought to a premature halt by lumps of rock and concrete barriers.

I’d been nervous of coming here, having previously having had some strange experiences which
had caused me to feel threatened. It’s a place where people present as shadows, and are not always welcoming of intrusive observation. When I parked on Cottenham Lane, and saw several CCTV cameras atop lamp posts, I felt relieved to be watched.

I’d been to scout the area a week or so before, and had been attracted by the Cuddly Cod chippy, a strange name, I felt for a fish. Surely the last thing a Cod is, is cuddly? Opposite was a large industrial unit, that hummed with power from a generator in the car park.

The area is currently the focus for ambitious regeneration plans, with thousands of new homes and a park intended to replace the patchwork of businesses strung out along its strange roads.
As I stood between the chippy and the industrial unit, I tried to imagine the place with houses, populated by families whose children would be playing in gardens, blissfully unaware that
beneath the grass lay the archaeology of industry. I doubted that the chip shop would survive, providing for a Friday night tradition to continue. And I thought of the city without me, my life ending before such plans will be realised.

I crossed the road, with the glass towers of Greengate rising upwards in the distance, and discovered a peculiar U-Shaped street, on which there was an old pub named the Albert Inn.
The tight brick work looked to be crumbling in places, and I guess it had been built in the early part of the 19th Century. A limp, faded Union Jack twitched in the breeze, and it was clear that John Jones, the licensee named above the door, hadn’t served a pint in there for some time.

There was, however, a light on in the first floor window, and a car parked outside, indicating someone now lived there. As I looked from the kerb, a woman drove by, slowing as she passed, and staring at me through her window. It occurred to me that she would have had to detour off the main route, as this street went nowhere, and I wondered if she’d sought me out, fearful of my intentions. But, I thought, as she moved on, at least I was being watched.