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Museums ready to welcome visitors
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By ELEANOR DOWD
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Let’s go shopping
Stadiums re-open with capacity of 2,000
ational Museums Liverpool (NML) has announced that its museums and galleries will reopen to the
public today. After a pretty tough year, full of restrictions and social distancing, it seems that the final month of 2020 could be slightly more joyous. Laura Pye, Director of National Museums Liverpool said: “We’d like to thank the people of Liverpool for supporting the mass testing pilot, which has helped to drive down the number of Covid cases in the city, enabling us to reopen our museums and galleries in the run up to Christmas. “We must, however, remain vigilant so this achievement doesn’t go to waste. “We are asking visitors to follow our safety procedures such as booking in advance and wearing face coverings. We also encourage visitors to regularly get tested so we can keep the transmission rate
down and continue to welcome people to our venues.” She added: “With the festive season upon us, Blackler’s Santa has become a firm festive favourite at the Museum of Liverpool since joining our collection in 2013. It’s wonderful that he is back this year to delight visitors amid what has been a very uncertain time, bringing back memories back for many, whilst creating new ones for the younger generation. “We’ll also be keeping the Black Lives Matter conversation going by celebrating key figures who have shaped the city’s Black music scene in Champion One, Champion All! and encouraging visitors to continue helping us shape the future of World Cultures gallery, enabling us to create displays and a space where issues of colonialism and injustice can be openly explored.” As long as visitors continue to follow government guidelines and safety procedures, then the things we took for granted before COVID-19 will hopefully remain open.
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Credit @Un
We’ll be home for Christmas...
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tudents in Liverpool are preparing to go back to their families after the announcement of a six-day travel window after the end of the current four-week lockdown. Will Liverpool be prepared for some travel chaos? The six days will see different universities sending their students’ home, with staggered departure dates. Liverpool alone has nearly 60,000 students and sending them all home on the same day could lead to mass amounts of people at railway stations, airports, boat docks and bus depots. The chaos could even cause a back-up among student accommoda-
tion, with a large number of parents arriving on the same day. Students have been advised that all teaching will be online by December 9, which is a week before the end of term and right in the middle of important deadlines for some courses. The government hopes this will minimise the risk of students taking coronavirus back to their home addresses, especially after mass testing has been offered during the lockdown period. Aaron Woods, a second year Business student, from Northern Ireland, said: “I was going to stay till the end of term, but was shocked to see the boats are all sold
out towards then whereas there are loads of cheap boats home during the travel window. Maybe more people are staying at University than I thought.” Even after the government released this information, it seems that not all students agree that this implemented plan will be effective. A Liverpool Life survey of students at different universities across the country showed that 56% of students asked would not be travelling home during the travel window, with 12 out of 54 people saying they would be waiting until the end of term to make their travel plans. A total of 43% of students
By NEVE WILKINSON said they would be using public transport to go home, so if all of these were to depart on the same day it could make social distancing harder, and even lead to the spread of coronavirus. One student nurse said: “I’m on placement until December 21st so it is impossible for us to go home in that window. It also gives transport companies an incentive to increase their prices on those dates”. With Christmas coming up, money already being a struggle this year, and now being told when to travel, students are advised to shop around for the best deals for tickets. “
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