other alteration to the route, promulgated under the 1866 Act, was as the result of Warrington residents agitating to have the railway come closer to the town centre. The 1865 plan had Warrington station positioned to the north on the straight route, halfway between and stations in a direct line; this would have been about further from the town. A loop was constructed into the town and and goods yard was constructed on it. The loop and station opened in 1873; the direct route, otherwise known as the Warrington avoiding line, was not opened until 1883. In 1897 an impressive two-storey brick goods warehouse was built in the goods yard, superseding an earlier smaller structure. A further MS&LR Act, the MS&LR (Liverpool Extension) Act of 1866, then formally transferred these lines into the CLC. The direct line to Liverpool Brunswick was opened in 1873 and, from then, the CLC used this more direct route between Manchester London Road and . The route was further improved when Liverpool Central station opened on 1 March 1874, bringing trains into the city centre. The station was situated on Ranelagh Street on the edge of the city centre and was a much grander station of three stories with a large arched roof and six platform faces. At the same time as Central opened, Brunswick closed to passenger traffic; it became a goods station and a much larger warehouse was built around the original station building. The building was so large, about , it was long enough to write the owners names in full Great Northern, Manchester Sheffield & Lincolnshire and Midland Railways. In 1879, a connection was made from the direct line to the expanding town of Widnes; the Widnes loop line ran from a junction between and to the south, through and back to join the direct line at . The line was jointly owned by the MS&LR and the MR; the CLC ran a passenger service on the line. The loop line closed in 1964. The building of the Manchester Ship Canal resulted in two diversions of the line in order to cross the canal at a high level on fixed bridges. The first was at Irlam where a diversion was constructed to the south of the original line and a new was constructed, both the old route and the diversion were operational from 9 January 1893 to 27 March 1893 when