AN exhibition which highlights the role public transport played during the Second World War has opened in Manchester.

Portals - light boxes - at the Metrolink stop in Piccadilly display photographs from the archives of the Imperial War Museum North showing how civilians kept public transport running during the Second World War.

The exhibition, which is funded by Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive, is timed to coincide with the Imperial War Museums exhibition, The North At War.

Liz Micklethwaite, GMPTE's head of corporate Communications, said: "The portals are proving very popular with commuters, and are an accessible way of taking art and exhibitions to people.

"This latest exhibition is interesting because it shows that, despite air raids and the disruption that the war brought, everyday things such as public transport still had to continue.

"Some of the photographs show people briskly travelling as usual, and the role that women played in staffing stations - cleaning signals, for example. Others are more poignant - evacuated children waving goodbye and an unknown soldier following the railway track home, carrying his boots in his hand."

The Piccadilly exhibition runs until mid-September.

The North At War is at the Imperial War Museum North until January 8, 2006.