I finally finished off collating data on all the tower blocks in the Black Country. I recognise that it makes me weird, but it was great fun playing with a spreadsheet. I now have mappable data of all these buildings: 276 blocks containing 17428 dwellings, housing how many people?
My next question: Who lived in them? Why did they live in them? Where were they before? Were they re-housed, were they given no choice? Was it a major improvement or a downgrade in their lifestyles? What were their opinions of these new types of living?
Many of my family used to live in tower blocks, mainly Wayne House, Brownhills. For all of them it was somewhere they lived when they got married, which they saw as ideal they used to get the milkman, fruit and veg man, newspaper delivery etc all within the block it was quite a community. Once people started expecting children the tower blocks became a problem when the lifts broke and you lived on 10th floor (having to carry children & pushchairs) that’s when they started to get offered alternative accommodation for their expanding families. I was also told by my great grandmother who used to live in one of the tower blocks in Newtown, Birmingham (recently knocked down) that Birmingham was over populated and not enough homes of they couldn’t afford the rent/ mortgage so this housing was affordable and put much needed roofs over heads. Again Birmingham being over populated they moved people into birminghams over flow areas one of them being Aldridge. That is where we have been since. Hope this adds a bit more insight I could find out more if needed. 🙂
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Hi Hannah!
Anything you can tell us about high-rise living in the Black Country is great. It sounds like your experiences were mostly positive as well, which is a great contrast to a lot of people’s expectations.
You’re very welcome to drop me an email: simonbriercliffe(at)gmail.com
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