I’ve submitted a first draft of my proposal! Turns out that this blog was certainly a help initially, but was the first casualty when it turned out I had actual work to do. Now for a bit of a breather though, maybe I can catch up. My next project, mentioned previously, is Block Capital, for which I’m putting together a geo-database of all 276 municipally- built, multi-storey housing blocks built by the Black Country boroughs. It satisfies my cravings for something to do in the snatches when I need a break from work, and also for playing with maps and spreadsheets.
I’m almost done with it, at least in its basic form. But I’ve hit a stump: the Heath Town Estate in Wolverhampton. This is a monolithic series of high rise, medium rise and low rise blocks, inter-connected with raised walkways in between blocks (the very sort that caused such problems during the Broadwater Farm riots) and over the Wolverhampton Road. It’s pretty bleak, although judging by the pictures here, it’s not as bad as it was.
Anyway, my problems are pretty tame in comparison with the social ills of the estate: exactly which blocks are which? I have a list of 18 blocks of 6 storeys or more. It’s easy enough to identify the high ones, but the connectedness of the 6-8 storey blocks is really confusing. I’m going to have to spend the day on it…
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