your comments
Paul Morgan ex Barry
The subway was built so that dock workers from Cardiff could walk easily to Penarth docks when needed. I can remember the Grangetown entrance but can't picture the exact place where the Penarth entrance was. I also think it was a damn shame that The Red House was demolished.
Gina from Cork (originally Grangetown)
I have been trying for years to find out about the subway. I remember going through to Penarth in the summer. Sorry to hear that the Red House has gone, it was quite a landmark.
Steve Wills, Grangetown
The day they demolished the Red House I could have cried, and I could possibly say half the population of Grangetown felt the same. I remember when I was young I would go down with my mum and dad in the summer and have a lemonade with my brothers and sisters, while my mum and dad sat on the river wall listening to old tapes being played from my dad's car. The Red House was then to become my local for many, many, many years, all of which I will remember fondly with friends and loved ones. There is no possible way that the council had the wright to demolish this landmark when over 5,000 signatures were sent in to keep the place open. This little place would have been a little gold mine when the so called sports village opened, but no, let's make way for the posh multi storey eyesores they prefer.
Alex (Sandy) Leitch - Fife ex Grangetown
The subway used to connect Penarth Docks with Grangetown and, of course, the railway. A lot of Grangetown people used to use the subway to get to Penarth beach via the stench of a local pig farm near the Grangetown end. We used to use the subway 2 or 3 times a week in the summertime to access Penarth Docks and onward. This was because quite a lot of us Grangetown (and the docks) boys were members of Penarth Sea Cadets. We attended 2 evenings a week and most summertime Saturdays/Sundays for boat pulling, bugle band practice and work on the unit launch. There were no lights in the subways by that time about 1957 onwards but with stout hearts, and sometimes a tin torch, we made our way through the dark tunnel beneath the River Ely. At the Penarth end was a set of turnstiles and, quite often, a lurking British Transport policeman who used to occasionally shout at us and chase us because the dock in those days were still a functioning dock and the subway was officially closed. I clearly remember a dock welder tack-welding one of the bobbies' bikes to the side of HMS Guardian (I think) while he was in hot and hopeless foot pursuit of some of us(not me, I was hiding!). There were 5 or 6 Royal Navy vessels in 'Cocoon state', preserved, I guess, as reserve ships from the end of either the Korea or Suez conflicts). I'm not sure when the subway was actually closed/filled in because I left Cardiff in 1961 to join the Royal Navy and my parents moved to Cheltenham a few years later.
Liz Summers ex Grangetown
I too have fond memories of the Red House as a child but can anyone remember the old subway going under the water over to Penarth? Can anyone tell me why it was built and when? My brother used to frighten the life out of me running off into the dark dragging a stick along the corrugated iron walls!!!!
Winifred Byrne - Fairwater, ex Grangetown
It's so sad that the Red House has been demolished. I have many happy memories of the Red House. As children, we would go blackberry picking with our mothers along the railway line which was near the Red House. There would be a crowd of us all carrying sweet jars which had string around the neck to make a handle which made it easier for carrying. Once we had finished our blackberry picking, we along with our mothers would sit on the bank outside the Red House and drink lemonade to quench our thirst. When I was older and went to the Red House for a proper drink, I can remember the brown lino on the floor and the coal fires. It always had a lovely atmosphere, and probably looked much the same before the war.
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