Professor Paul Salveson is a historian and writer and lives in Bolton. He is visiting professor in ‘Worktown Studies’ at the University of Bolton and author of several books on Lancashire history You’d have to be of a certain age to remember Bolton’s ‘other’ railway, which ran from Great Moor Street station, now part of Morrison’s car park. It was the terminus for two lines – the Leigh and Kenyon Junction line, via Chequerbent, and the route to Manchester via Walkden and Little Hulton. The Leigh line opened as early as 1828 and pre-dates even the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. The Bolton and Leigh Railway was the first ‘public’ railway in Lancashire and is of huge historical importance, engineered by George Stephenson and projected as early as 1824.