Wood Street days

This morning I had a clinic visit, and did the heavy part of this week's shopping, as re-stocking a few bulk items was necessary. In the afternoon, I went into town and took photos of the St David's House demolition, which is almost complete. The entirety of the new HMRC building is now visible, and part of its next door neighbour, the Media Wales offices. Once the site is fully cleared there will be 150 yards open public space in front of these prestigious buildings. 

The place north of Wood Street, called Temperance Town was once a slummy Victorian residential area, near the newly built Cardiff General Station. It was on land freed by the diversion of the river Taff, according to a plan devised by Brunel. The wartime blitz took its toll, and remaining houses were razed by commercial redevelopment in the early sixties. Near the river on the train station side, was a fine 'Arts and Crafts' Tractarian church, St Dyfrig's designed by J D Sedding, built 1895-1920. 

I remember seeing it as a student when returning home by train from Bristol. By that time its congregation was tiny, and its Vicar doubled as a student chaplain. It was declared redundant and demolished in 1969, the site having been acquired during construction of an improved road bridge over the Taff. All the sixties buildings are now gone, replaced by the Central Square redevelopment which I have been photo documenting for the past four years. Three complete make-overs of this area in the past hundred and sixty years, and such a wealth of forgotten stories of Cardiff's working class and in this instance, the church's mission to them. Wood Street also had a big Congregational Church, and three schools serving the population.

Photo mission accomplished, yet again, I took a 63 bus out to Danescourt for a bereavement visit in preparation for a funeral next Monday, and walked back to Llandaff to catch a bus rather than wait 25 minutes at the nearest bus stop.

I then had a second funeral preparation to deal with, for a service on Tuesday next, but this time by phone call only, and no prior meeting. This is usually due to physical distance, but on this occasion it was more a matter of distance between the next of kin and the departed. As a result, wasn't easy to acquire any learn anything concrete about the life of the departed to use in the service. It's necessary to accept the trust granted to do the right thing, whatever the circumstances and the story that is or isn't to be told.