Hull in print

Judith Preston Anderson on the soon-to-be completed street linking Park Street to Ferensway.
Her suggestion to call it 'Margaret Moxon Way" in honour of the Hull missionary beat hundreds of entries in a Hull in print competition

It's going to be one of Hull's busiest streets with about 360 bus movements every hour – and it's going to be called 'Margaret Moxon Way.'
Hundreds of entries were submitted to Hull in print's competition to find a name for the street which winds through the heart of the St Stephen's development, linking Ferensway with Park Street.
Entries included names in honour of local heroes such as Flash Flannigan Way after the rugby league legend, Lil Bilocca Street after the trawler safety campaigner and Beautiful South Boulevard after Hull's world-famous pop group.
But the entry which was chosen as the winner is the name of a lesser-known local hero.

Margaret Moxon (1808 – 1891)

A mother-of-six, she was the only Hull-born person of her generation to work with freed slaves in Sierra Leone, and also carried out missionary work with Maori families in New Zealand.
Born in North Street, in the parish of Southcoates, she was the daughter of businessman and banker John Moxon, whose family lived in High Street, next-door-but-one to Wilberforce House.
She began her missionary work after travelling to London to work as a governess where she met her husband the German missionary George Adam Kissling.

Competition winner

Judith Preston Anderson (left) and Mavis Burnham, who suggested the name 'The Milky Way' for a smaller street in honour of the Northern Dairies depot once at the site

The name 'Margaret Moxon Way' was suggested by Mrs Judith Preston Anderson (68), of Coltman Street, who is the church warden at St. Mary's in Lowgate.
Mrs Preston put forward the name because of the link with Hull's Wilberforce 2007 programme, but also because the Moxon family originally owned the land on which St Stephens is built, and because there used to be a 'Moxon Street' and a 'Moxon Square' on the site many years ago.
Also fitting is the fact that the missionary school Margaret Moxon helped set up in New Zealand was also called 'St Stephen's.'
"Margaret's descendants still live in New Zealand and they'll be delighted to think that she is still being remembered like this," says Mrs Anderson. "And next year will be Margaret Moxon's bi-centenary!"

The Milky Way

A smaller new street within the development, which links Colonial Street to Spring Street, will be called The Milky Way, in recognition of the Northern Dairies distribution depot which once stood on the site. The closure of the dairies, about 10 years ago, triggered the St Stephen's development opportunity.
The name was suggested by Mavis Burnham, of Summergroves Way, Hessle High Road, who says: "I worked in the Park Street Dairy for many years. This would be a good memory for all the people who worked there."

Judging

Judging was carried out by Hull City Council's highways team, Hull Citybuild and St. Stephen's developers.
"We knew the post office wouldn't approve of some of the suggestions because they were too similar to other streets," says Graham Hall, highways and transportation manager at Hull City Council, who deals with the operational side of naming streets in the city.
"We expressed a preference for names with a historical connection with the site. It's also a tradition that streets honour people who have died before honouring the living."

St Stephen's facts and figures

It opens in September and will create about 2,500 permanent jobs. A recruitment fair will take place on September 19 at Hull City Hall.
It will house 50 shops, all of which are top high street names, including some names new to Hull.
The site also includes:
- 220 homes (to be built in a later phase) and a 120-bed hotel
- 1,450 parking spaces, some at rooftop level
- A glass-roofed central street which will be open 24-hours
More than 446,000 people with a collective retail spend of £1.65 billion each year live within a 30 minute drive.
Nearly £2m was spent every week during building. Materials used have included:
- 45,000m3 of concrete
- 7,500 tonnes of steel (including reinforcing and structuring steel)
- 450 panels and 3,000 individual elements in feature roof glazing
- Several hundred kilometres of cabling and ducting
- 9,000 square metres of granite paving.
The development also includes a £3 million Albermarle music centre, which will be used by 600 young musicians every week and includes a performance venue for up to 250 people.
It also includes a brand new home for Hull Truck Theatre (to open in 2008), as well as cafés, restaurants and bars (to open later this year).


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