All Saints Park

Tiny little city park. You don’t exactly feel like you’re getting away from it all as you’re never more than 100 yards from the Oxford Road «busiest in western Europe» bus corridor. That said it is quite nice to sit in and enjoy the squirrels and greenery. The cherry trees are just lovely at the moment. Plus there’s some nice old buildings to two sides of the park, I’m clearly not including the MMU library here.
There are lots of students and university people sitting in or walking through the park. It feels a bit like that proverb — if you sit in one place long enough you’ll see the whole world pass by. I feel like I saw a lot of Manchester residents from my park bench. This is a nice spot to enjoy a lunch, made pretty easy by the permanent fruit stand and abundance of fast food available within throwing distance. Despite these it’s a noticeably tidy park with lots of mini recycling centres dotted about.

Of course it’s a park. What are the criteria for a park, you ask? Greenness, I answer.
Anyway this is a good place to study in the sun. This practice can be aided by All Saints Library, right next to this park (hence the shared name), which is full of books. These books are full of information which, if read, will make you clever.
Its also a great place to have lunch, as there are take-​aways and food outlets surrounding the park, including a greasy burger van and a fresh fruit and veg stall, depending on which of those polar opposite you prefer.
Also, its quite pretty. I like pretty things. Especially pretty girls.

I used to feel sorry for students at Manchester Metropolitan University. When for those three or four weeks an academic year when it would actually get sunny enough to sit outside (which would also irritatingly arrive just around exam time) they would have nowhere to do it. We had the little tapered rectangle of grass between the lime grove humanities building and the refectory but they appeared to have nowhere. This was upsetting because sitting on grass, as anyone who has watched an American college-​based movie or taken a cursory glance through a glossy prospectus, is what being a University student it all about.
As it turns out they got to sit here. It’s not the property of the University; it is in fact a small public park, but this was where they would usually be during those balmy few weeks. Kicking a ball around; eating an ice lolly; reading a trade paperback about a mentally disturbed forensic detective — all that good stuff. I have to admit I was jealous; it was a lot nicer than where we got. Nicer trees, a few small hills, some flowers even. I couldn’t believe it.
Of course everyone could go there but it still rankled.

All Saints Park is a small patch of grass right by the Manchester universities and near Oxford Road train station. Granted, you can still hear loads of traffic going past on the busy road, but it’s a good spot to go and eat your sandwich in at lunchtime.
All Saints Park is pretty small, so don’t head here expecting to go running or anything like that.