South of Manchester, looming over golden fields and wind-tossed oaks, the superstructure of Jodrell Bank’s Lovell radio telescope dazzled in the July sun. A local landmark, it is visible from motorway and train-line yet always looks out of place in such a resolutely rural part of Cheshire, like a clunking tripod from War of the Worlds. But it is from here that Britain’s scientists turn their faces to the farthest reaches of the cosmos.

Jodrell Bank itself is owned by the University of Manchester, a legacy of that brief moment after the second world war when Manchester was at the cutting edge of technology in a way not seen since the height of the Industrial Revolution saw the city sucking in workers to feed its ever-thrumming textile looms. Alan Turing, a code-breaker during the war, experimented with programmable and stored memory computers at the university. And Bernard Lovell, fresh from his war-time research on radar, persuaded the Botany department to let him set up an experimental radio telescope on its Cheshire site with the idea that sound could reach further into space than mere sight.

Lovell’s dream was to build the Mk I radio telescope, later renamed in his honour. The Mk I is a 250-foot-diameter dish, fully steerable around a central axis, designed to suck in ‘cosmic rays’ and bounce them up to a central receiver suspended above the bowl. Construction began in 1952 and soon ran over budget. It was saved, by all people, by the Soviets. Just as the telescope became operational in the summer of 1957 the USSR launched Sputnik 1, the world’s first artificial satellite. The Mk I was the only device able to track Sputnik’s booster rocket. Funding rushed in. The American Pioneer probes were tracked from Jodrell Bank and the first images of the moon’s surface were intercepted from the Soviet Luna 9 and printed out on a fax machine. Oh, and the site also found some time to indulge in some proper astronomical science too. In fact, over 60 years later and the MK I is still in use – along with other linked radio telescopes at the Jodrell Bank site, across the UK, and further afield. It remains the third largest fully steerable radio telescope in the world.

So in terms of Outstanding Universal Value, I think the UK has hit upon something with a good chance of gaining nomination. Science and engineering from the second half of the 20th century is missing from the List, and the most modern observatory on the list would otherwise be that in Maritime Greenwich.

As a visitor the high-tech science aspect only comes through from the exhibitions on site and guided tours. For something from the cusp of the space age the most notable feature is Jodrell Bank’s resolutely mid-20th century engineering. Lovell pulled in favours from the armed forces: an early telescope was mounted on a searchlight array and the motor systems used to pivot the Mk I telescope were constructed from battleship gun turrets. The Control Building (in the back right of my photo) is the sort of unlovely brick and glass construction you might expect to see at a minor airfield – except for the telescope dish mounted on its roof. But that helps to put it into context, as do the guided tours (in reality little more than a walk-and-talk along a looping path dotted with information board). The tour provided snippets of information like how in winter the on-site staff occasionally have to tilt the telescope dishes to clear them of snow or how the staff constructed their own Faraday cage so they could have a microwave oven on site without it corrupting their readings. Some of these stories should be more fully fleshed out by the new First Light Pavilion which is currently under construction.

Note that the First Light Pavilion is not within the Nominated Property Boundary. Nor is the Planet Pavilion (which houses ticket desk, shop, café and an introduction to astronomy). Exiting through the Planet Pavilion and turning right the Property Boundary seems to begin as you reach the Star Pavilion (which is only open for school trips and pre-booked science experiences). The Space Pavilion – which continues the story with the work of the observatory – is within the Boundary, as is the Control Building and the Lovell Telescope itself. The property then continues through a narrow neck beyond the Control Building to a much larger area which captures a few other telescopes (including the elliptical 1960s Mk II), workshops and dormitories, all the way back to the remains of the first searchlight aerial and the botany huts. This area is not accessible to the public although it backs on to the A535 road at the site’s southern boundary.

Entry is £7.25 per adult, £5.40 for those aged 4-16, over 60 or with student ID. As Solivagant noted, a parking charge of £4 per car will come into effect from 5th September 2018 – a factor which helped us decide to visit beforehand. And without a car you’re unlikely to make it to Jodrell Bank. Their own website recommends that those reliant on public transport make their way to Macclesfield and get a taxi from there (there is a nearer station at Goostrey on the Manchester to Crewe line, but it is served less frequently and still requires a 2.5 mile walk down country lanes to reach the observatory. We visited with a toddler so the hard-core science was of less interest to him than exploring the gardens (left out of the Planet Pavilion and hence not within the site boundary), investigating some of the outdoor experiments (the whispering dishes being a firm favourite) and taking part in some of the supported childrens’ activities in the Space Pavilion like drawing planets.

Jodrell Bank is certainly worth half-a-day if you are in the Cheshire / Manchester area and have your own transport. More interestingly for me, should it be inscribed, it means that my front door will qualify as a ‘Hotspot’ (40 mins to Jodrell Bank, 40 mins to Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, 40 mins to Liverpool, 1 hr to Conwy Castle, 1 hr 30 to Ironbridge Gorge, the Lake District, Saltaire or the Derwent Valley).

World Heritage-iness: 3

My Experience: 1.5

(Visited July 2018)