The Golden Square is quite a nice shopping center, especially for a small town like Warrington. It…read moreis Warrington's main shopping center alongside Cockhedge, which is mainly there just to house an Asda store. As you can tell by its name, Golden Square is basically a large, indoor "Square" of shops, with 135 shops in total according to their website, all over one floor. I dislike the approach of it all being over one floor, being used to seeing shopping centers on multiple floors, which also allows room for more shops, but Warrington's Golden Square also has a few stores in an outside square to it, which is also quite nice including Rhode Island Coffee and a Post Office, which is a nice area. The Shopping Center as I said is quite nice, both inside and out with a good range of shops, including WHSmtih, EE, Starbucks CEX, JD, 3, Waterstones and Vision Express, just to name a few. Due to the shape of the mall, it is quite easy to navigate around. This mall is quite nice for a small town and although it isn't somewhere I'd recommenced you constantly go out of your way to go here, it is well worth a look in if you are in the area as it is a nice shopping center, with a good range of shops and is great for a small town like Warrington, hence a solid 3 star rating.

A shopping centre in the centre of Warrington town centre with all your usual high street shops -…read moreBoots, WHSmith, Next, M&S. Its all under cover so the potential bad English weather won't be a factor. According to their web site, there are 135 stores inside. I went recently a few days before Christmas and it wasn't too busy - nothing like shopping centres like Arndale Centre or Trafford Centre (actually never normally go to Trafford Centre but especially near Christmas but I think I can safely say its crazy busy!) Didn't stay too long but went to Boots and also went to Debenhams for some food - which was actually pretty good. There is multi storey car parking but unfortunately it is not free. For under an hour, its £1. It goes up to £5.50 if you are more than 4 hours. Between 2-4 hours is £2.20 which is not too bad I guess.

I've been using Warrington Central much more over the past week or so and the station is improving,…read moreespecially in terms of cleanliness and service. While it is an old and basic station, it is pretty nice for an old town and it's pretty easy to get in and out of the station quickly to continue on with your journey. Minimal facilities inside the station but with Warrington's Golden Square Centre being a couple of minutes away, as well as an ASDA nearby that, is helpful. If you're heading into Manchester/Liverpool, there seem to be more services which go from here rather than Bank Quay, including the fastest train into Manchester which goes from here to Piccadilly with East Midlands Railway. 3* - Decent station for a small town, pretty minimal but improving so that's a good thing.

Warrington Central is one of two major stations in Warrington (the other being Bank Quay), and is…read moreserved by trains on 'southern route' from Liverpool to Manchester. The line was opened in 1873 by the Cheshire Lines Committee, a venture formed by the Manchester Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway and the Great Northern railway, joined by the Midland Railway. The line originally ran from Manchester Central to Liverpool Central via Garston, although services were concentrated on Piccadilly and Lime St stations respectively from the late 1960s. The station has two platforms, built on a viaduct: the original main station building on the north side, in an Italianate style of yellow stock brick with red and blue brick details, has been converted into commercial offices, and a new smaller building built on Winwick Street. The station's modern entrance houses a ticket office, small shop and coffee stand, leading via stairs (or newly-installed lifts) to the two platforms. These retain the attractive original retaining walls and their canopies, with decorated brackets, although the original wooden awnings have unfortunately been replaced by ugly corrugated steel versions. The Manchester-bound platform (1) has toilets and a waiting room, whereas the Liverpool platform (2) has only a modern glass waiting room. The station is served by three rail companies: Northern operate a half hourly Liverpool (Lime St) to Manchester (Piccadilly) service, some of which stop at all stations, with others semi-fast. TransPennine Express operate an hourly fast service to Liverpool westbound and Leeds via Manchester eastbound, some of which continue to York, Scarborough or Middlesbrough. East Midlands trains operate an hourly Liverpool to Norwich via Nottingham and Sheffield service, taking over 5 hours to Norwich! There is level access throughout, and Warrington's Bus Station (known as the 'Interchange') is a short walk away under the railway bridge.

This shopping centre is ok, not the greatest amount of shops here but that's fine as the town…read morecentre is a right next to it. Its a pity about having to pay parking fees to go and buy something from Argos or Staples etc.. maybe Argos should consider doing ticket stamping like Asda do.. but make it 'within 10 minutes of stamping' instead of Asdas 2 hours. Asda make a lot of money out of people going in to buy £5 worth of shopping to get their ticket stamped .. most people stay longer and buy far more shopping. haha ;-) Needs more parent and toddler parking spaces too!!!

Cockhedge Shopping center is a shopping center in Warrington town center, to use my Manchester City…read moreterminology, it is a bit like the Brian Kidd of Warrington, the Assistant, the deputy, I'm sure many people will agree that this is "the second" shopping center in Warrington, due to its size and number of shops in comparison to the larger Golden Square. I'm going to start with the parking situation which was a bit poor, they is an entrance here with a sort of pay station on your way in and out, on my visit it wasn't manned and the shutters were up to just come in and out as you please. They was a parking sign which looked pretty old and suggested Cockhedge did not actually own the car park, and the prices looked rather expensive too and they contradicted the sign in the window that mentioned Cockhedge had 2 hours free parking. I found this to be rather misleading as they were 2 different parking prices, they really do need to get rid of one sign, as it will confuse most people, especially people (like myself) who are not from Warrington. They is only a few shops here, and most of them seem to be your typical discount stores, such as Wilko, Pound world and B & M, Gala also have a large bingo hall here, Greggs, Argos and Superdrug finish off the list of big names here, which just proves they isn't a lot here and it isn't really worth taking the trip in, unless you do need to go to ASDA. This shopping center didn't have a good atmosphere to it too, with lots of small shops, some with probably are very local stores, and mainly discounters, which made me feel like I was in a market as well, and with music playing and it being very quiet, It just didn't feel like a city center at all, and felt worse than that. When considering the lack of shops and parking situation, I wouldn't bother going out of the way to come here unless you do need to go to Asda, as it is in general sadly a very poor shopping mall, and probably the stores here would be better transferring into the newer, larger Golden Square or on the street level.

The Library has just undergone a refurb. Sadly in…read moremodernising it it's lost it's stately feel. Users now no longer seem to respect the library Quietness and it now has the feel of a supermarket were people speak at full volume. I think the library has lost a lot. Maybe the new open feeling is what people want and they don't want libraries to be quite places any more.

Very helpful staff. Didn't have a few books in that I…read morewanted but they ordered them for me, took two weeks as one was very new so popular so was understandable. It would be nice if there was better parking facilities. Its relaxed and easy to use the new book check in and out system.

Warrington seems to have a good number of retail parks, and Riverside Retail Park is one of them,…read morejust outside the town centre, it has a couple of large stores and brands, including Sports Direct, Home Bargains, B&M, Next and a drive-thru McDonald's, with a couple of empty units with other stores either closing or moving to other retail locations across Warrington. I did find a lack of lighting and a dead atmosphere around the retail park, making it feel slightly run-down, especially compared to JunctionNINE and Gemini Retail Parks, which seem to offer a better selection of stores in the same town. There are only two hours of free parking here, and you will be fined if you overstay that welcome, so do tread accordingly, two hours is more than enough time as there isn't a lot of things to do here anymore, but those looking to spend any significant length of time in McDonald's and then one or two shops, may feel rushed. There always seem to be plenty of car parking spaces here though. 2* - Only useful for a handful of stores, which would probably be better located in the town centre's other retail parks, seems like an unnecessary burden to have this additional one that doesn't offer a great deal to the town.

I avoid leaving my car here, the ramp is too steep and very tight parking spaces. It's always dirty…read moreand the smell isn't nice either, lfts dont always work and they smell a bit like a toilet. If you can, park somewhere else and avoid and expencive let down.