TRAVELLERS REST PUBLIC HOUSE, NEW FERRY ROAD, October 2001
In 2006, the former Travellers Rest pub, as seen on the 1910s page, was converted into a row of new cottages (the existing building became three cottages, whilst two new ones were built to the right). The pub had been empty and boarded up for many years. Here it is seen in its final days before the builders moved in to start work.
TOLL BAR CROSSROADS, November 2002
Businesses have come and gone over the years. Older residents will remember the corner store as Rostances, but by the early 2000s it was a bookmakers before becoming a vaping shop. That too has now gone and the building opened in September 2026 as The Tollbar public house.
KWIK SAVE STORE, seen from the rear at WOODHEAD STREET, November 2002:
Kwik Save built their new store in 1991. It later became Gateway, Somerfield, then Co-op which closed in 2016. Following the explosion in 2017, the building was home to the Phabulous Community Hub until the council purchased it in 2023 to demolish it and make way for the Regenda redevelopment scheme.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2002:
Many people will remember getting their sausage rolls and cakes from Sayers over the years. The building has now been vacant for several years since the company quit New Ferry - just like so many of the national brands have done, sadly.
GOLDEN STAR FISH & CHIPS, 165 NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2002
One of the Ferry's favourite chippies back in the day. Mark Anthony Craig recalls queuing in there in the early 2000s. A tall customer came in, talking on his mobile phone, but dropped it over the counter into the deep fat fryer. The Chinese owner fished it out and asked "Deep fried mobile phone?" Other customers collapsed, laughing.
NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2002
At that time, HSBC Bank was at the corner of New Chester Road and the Bebington Road precinct. It closed soon afterwards before Money Matters moved in. This was also the last days of Kwik Save before the store was taken over by Gateway (then Somerfields, then the Co-op).
NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2002
The former NatWest Bank also departed New Ferry in the early 1990s, later becoming Shillings Bar until the late 2010s. More recently, since 2022 it has been home to Becky's Unique Sewing Boutique.
NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2002
Little did we know back then that the days of our beloved Woolworths were numbered. How many New Ferry kids loved going in there before Christmas to choose what toys they wanted? Today it is Heron foodstore.
NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2002
Over the years, several businesses have come and gone along this stretch. The building to the left is now "The Cyclist" pub.
NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2002
How many people remember the chemist that was once next to Discount Inferno II? More recently the home of The Chocolate Cellar, it has recently been taken over by Airsoft247 Ltd. The Twilight Cafe is long gone, the building now a burned out shell. Ted Ross's building yard to the right was replaced with modern flats in the mid 2000s.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2002
For many years, Tracey's Florist supplied shoppers with flowers and garden plants. The business closed down after the New Ferry explosion in 2017.
For two years, the New Ferry Regeneation Action Grouup (later renamed New Ferry Residents Association) rented a shop to consult on the New Ferry Regeneration Action Plan.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2002
For many years, shoppers flocked to Ethel Austin's for affordable clothes. The much loved store quit New Ferry by the end of the decade, and is much missed. What is known locally as "The Blackpool Shop" currently trades from the premises.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2002
Another view of Ethel Austins before it closed. The office upstairs was used by our then MP, Ben Chapman, as his constituency office.
Lloyds TSB was New Ferry's last bank and also quit in the early 2010s. Today the building is occupied by The Bulldog Public House.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2002
Pattons Jewellers is today the only surviving business in this block. The building in the centre is now a dance school.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2005
Kwik Save had three entrances; this one was onto the precinct and had a shoe shop inside it.
For many years a secondhand/junk shop traded from 9 Bebington Road. There was no heating inside the building, and in winter the shopkeeper sat huddled over a portable gas fire. Today this unit is occupied by Kesh Cafe.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2005
How many people remember Sizzlers Cafe for their toast, tea and breakfasts?
The Flower Girl was originally run by Karen Parkinson-Ward, but after the 2017 explosion the shop relocated to the other side of the street where it is now known as Amelia Jane Flowers.
BEBINGTON ROAD, April 2002
The precinct was still fairly busy on a Saturday in 2002. Kwik Save was still is business before it became Gateway and then Co-op in the years that followed. All of the shops from Kwik Save down to the Cleveland Arms all looked to be in use.
New Ferry also had a dry cleaners; when it closed, residents switched to the one in Bebington - but even that one closed down in
BEBINGTON ROAD, April 2002
Further down the precinct from the photo above we cab see the white sign of the New Ferry Regeneration Action Group shop, and beyond that the Connexions shop which would later be taken over by Pascal Blasio in 2016.
NEW FERRY REGENERATION ACTION GROUP SHOP, 2002
In 2000 the Council gave the residents association funding to open the shop so that community volunteers could share the New Ferry Regeneration Action Plan with residents, and get their feedback.
In this first photo, Arthur Waller (who would later be awarded an MBE for his services to this and the former military veterans' organisations) is standing i
The shop was mostly run by New Ferry resident Mel Roberts (otherwise known as the Butterfly Man for his involvement in setting up the New Ferry Butterfly Park next to which he lived). The shop operated for four years and closed after Mel sadly died.
Here, Arthur and Mel are seen working together inside the shop circa 2002. Arthur died a few years later.
THE DELL SCHOOL, 2005
How many people were pupils at the Dell Primary School which closed in 2006 following a review into primary schools in Wirral by the education authorities? Pupils transferred mostly to Grove Street, and plans were approved for the site to be redeveloped for housing - but nothing ever started.
In 2018, revised plans were approved to build 32 apartments and 39 houses on the
SOMERFIELD, NEW CHESTER ROAD June 2006
Kwik Save dominated New Ferry for over 20 years, but by 2006 when the company hit a few financial problems, they let some of their less profitable stores go. Somerfield took over the store which had been constructed in 1991 and were there for several years until it was taken over by the Co-op. Co-op quit in 2016. The building was demolished in 2025.
BEBINGTON ROAD, November 2006
Shoppers were spoilt for charity shops in the first decades of this century. At one time we had 6 of them, and three in this block alone which included Oxfam and Help the Aged. At the far end is the red and white canopy of Griffiths the Butchers.
This whole block was destroyed by the 2017 explosion.
RIGHTWAY DIY, BEBINGTON ROAD, June 2006:
For many years, until Wickes was built down the road in Tranmere, a whole generation of residents went to Rightway for all their decorating needs. Sadly, the store closed in 2012 when the London based owners insisted the company had to sign up to a minimum 5 year rental agreement at a much higher price than was sustainable.
EDGE THE BUTCHERS, NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2007
Edge the Butchers is New Ferry's oldest established business, and you can see photos of how it looked in the 1880s.
The facade was decorated with a mural by the renowned artist Paul Curtis in 2018.
TOLL BAR CROSSROADS, November 2007
Several of the businesses have changed here over the years, in particular the former Wynnstay Arms pub seen here in 2007 empty and painted blue at ground floor level. The Citizens Advice Bureau that New Ferry had, vanished in the early 2010s. The building is now home to the Martin Gallier Project.
"THE JOHN MASEFIELD", NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2007
Having spent its previous life as range of supermarkets in the last decades of the 20th century (including Kwik Save in the 1990s), pub chain Wetherspoons opened it as "The John Masefield" in November 2007. The painting of the famous artist was immediately controversial as it resembled WW2 Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.
PARK VIEW FLATS, NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2007
Ted Ross's builders yard was sold and demolished to make way for new flats that approached completion in 2007.
7-15 NEW CHESTER ROAD, November 2007
What was once a proud row of shops was looking in a very sorry state by 2007. The building to the right was burned down in a fire a few years earlier, whilst since this photo was taken, the last unit on the left has also burned down "in mysterious circumstances". New flats were eventually constructed on the site to the right.
LAST DAY OF WOOLWORTHS STORE 27 December 2008
It was a sad day, not only for New Ferry, but the rest of the country as well when our much beloved Woolworths stores all closed down for good. Many people will remember the friendly store in New Ferry, and its helpful staff. Whatever you needed, Woolies usually had it - and who can forget having your young children drag you through the toy aisles in
BROMBOROUGH LANDFILL FIRE May 2009
In May 2009, New Ferry and Bromborough residents had a bit of a scare one sunny weekend afternoon when some extremely misguided local youths sneaked onto the landfill site and set fire to some of the exposed bitumen impregnated lining material which BIFFA use as a layer between the tipped rubbish and clay/topsoil layer.
A massive plume of black smoke billowed i
What is worrying is that if the methane gas being produced by the rotting rubbish underneath the fire had ignited, there would have been a just a massive water-filled crater left where the landfill had once been. There could have been fatalities in the surrounding community when the tip could have exploded like a massively destructive bomb, far greater than the explosion which New Ferry endured i
RIGHTWAY DIY STORE, BEBINGTON ROAD, August 2009
Only three more years to go before it was sadly closed down.
BEBINGTON ROAD, 2009
Connexions (to the right) provided training and job skills advice to young people. Notice the trees in the precinct in those days.
BEBINGTON ROAD, 2009:
The former Morris Edwards gents clothes shop became Chinese buffet restaurant Yuan Da before it morphed into Lan's House.