Stand in the middle of Stanley Park on a Saturday morning and you can see both of the north end’s great football stories at once. Anfield rises over the trees to one side; the roofs of Goodison sit beyond Walton Lane on the other. For well over a century this patch of Victorian parkland was the only thing separating two of the most famous grounds in England, and it has soaked up more arguments, songs and post-match inquests than any pub in the city. Here is why it matters, and how to get the most out of a walk across it.
A park built for the people, not for football
Stanley Park opened in 1870, designed by the landscape gardener Edward Kemp as one of the grand public parks Liverpool laid out for its growing population. It was meant for promenading, fresh air and Sunday best, not for crowds of tens of thousands spilling out of turnstiles. The sandstone terraces, the boating lake with its little bridges and the long tree-lined walks were all there before either club had a ground to its name.
The football came later, and it came from the park itself. The side that became Everton started out playing on open ground in Stanley Park in the late 1870s before moving to Anfield. When the club fell out with its landlord, John Houlding, in 1892, Everton crossed to the other side of the park and built Goodison, and Houlding founded a new club to fill the empty ground. That club was Liverpool. Every Merseyside derby since has, in a sense, been a dispute that started on this grass.
One park, two tribes
On a matchday the park changes character completely. The dog walkers and joggers give way to a steady stream of scarves cutting across the paths, and you learn quickly that the crowd heading for Anfield and the crowd heading for the old Goodison side used to walk the same routes in opposite directions. Fathers would point out where they stood as kids. Groups would split at the lake with a handshake and a promise to meet in the pub afterwards, one half of them in a much better mood than the other.
That shared ground is a large part of why the rivalry has stayed so personal, something we wrote about in Derby Day: Why the Merseyside Derby Still Splits Households. You cannot keep your distance from the opposition when you have to walk past them under the same trees.
Other cities have a derby across town. Liverpool had one across a duck pond.
The stadium that never was
The park very nearly lost a chunk of itself. In the 2000s Liverpool drew up plans to build a new stadium on part of Stanley Park, and for a while the idea of a ground-share with Everton was floated in the press and in council chambers. Fans on both sides hated the ground-share, and the stadium plan eventually fell away. Liverpool chose to redevelop Anfield instead, adding the rebuilt Main Stand and then expanding the Anfield Road end, and the park kept its green space.
Looking back, it was the right outcome for the neighbourhood. A new stadium might have brought investment, but it would also have swallowed open space that families in Anfield and Walton rely on every day of the week, not just on matchdays.
Things worth seeing on a walk across
If you are visiting for a game, or you have lived here for years and never really looked, give yourself an hour. A few highlights:
- The Isla Gladstone Conservatory. A restored Victorian glasshouse on the park’s edge, now used as a café and events space. It is a good spot for a brew before the crowds build.
- The lake and bridges. The heart of Kemp’s design and still the best place to stop and take in the view of both grounds.
- The sandstone terraces and shelters. Built to give Victorian visitors somewhere to sit and look out over the park; worth a look for the stonework alone.
- The view towards Anfield. From the higher paths, the scale of the expanded stands becomes clear, and it is a reminder of how much the skyline of L4 has changed in twenty years.
The park has had serious restoration work over the years, and it shows. It is far from the neglected space some of us remember from the eighties and nineties.
What changes now Everton have gone to the docks
With Everton’s men’s side now playing on the waterfront, the old two-way traffic across the park has changed. Saturdays when the Blues are at home no longer send a tide of royal blue across the paths in the same way, and some of the cafes and pubs on the Walton side feel that keenly. We looked at what that means for the area in Goodison Memories and the Move to the Waterfront.
But the park has not lost its role as common ground. Evertonians still walk it for the memories, Liverpool fans still cut through it on their way in, and on non-matchdays it belongs to the people who live around it. If anything, the move has made it more obvious that Stanley Park was never just a car park with trees. It is a working public space with a remarkable footballing history attached.
How to do it properly on a matchday
A few practical pointers if you are crossing the park on the way to Anfield:
- Arrive early. The paths get busy in the last hour before kick-off, and the walk is far more enjoyable when it is not a shuffle.
- Keep to the lit main paths after an evening game. The park is wide open and dark in winter.
- Respect the space. Bins are there for a reason, and the people who live around the park clean up after every matchday.
- Look out for the memorials and plaques dotted around the area. They tell you more about the local history than any programme.