Description:‘CITY’S NEW SUBURB
MAKING THE DESERT BLOOM
DEVELOPMENT OF PERRY BARR ON MODERN LINES’
Headlines in the Birmingham News for 21st April 1928.
As early as 1913 an inquiry into the state of housing in Birmingham had concluded that the shortage of appropriate houses for the working class was acute and that the need could only realistically be met through the Council purchasing previously undeveloped districts. The Great War halted any progress and its immediate aftermath brought many difficulties for the City’s planners. By 1925 the Public Works Committee estimated that something like100.000 new houses would be needed in the following twenty years to meet the existing demand of the city’s population and to take account of slum clearance, With backing from Government in terms of financial grants for new municipal and private housing the city embarked on a massive house building programme. There were particular difficulties with finding land in the north of Birmingham. These difficulties were, at least partly, eased by the acquisition of Perry Barr.
Up to 1st April 1928 the Perry Barr District Council had responsibility for the area but its poverty meant that the district lacked any adequate sewerage or refuse system and it had only recently introduced street lighting. The main reason for this state of affairs was the fact that area covered by Perry Barr was still rural. There was the occasional farmhouse and cottage but essentially this was countryside. All this was to change with the City Council’s take-over. As the Birmingham newspapers reported: ‘it was the poverty of the defunct Perry Barr District Council’s resources which has kept the area in an undeveloped condition. Now, with the powers of a great city available, striking advance is to be made in the next few years’. Almost as soon as the City gained control over the area it applied under the Birmingham Housing Compulsory order of 1928 to acquire the 450 acres of land occupied by the Warren Farm (pictured here) and Kingsvale Farm estates. This was to provide the land for 6.700 new municipal houses.
(Exhibition written by Peter Drake)