Town Planning

The planting of trees in Birmingham streets began in 1875: planes were found to be best able to withstand the atmosphere, as they shed soot-laden bark. The opening of the Council House stimulated new building about Victoria Square, and for the first time Birmingham had a centre worthy of its importance, even if its buildings were very ugly. Statues of royalty and local worthies proliferated.

By the end of World War One the Council House was quite inadequate: the extension was opened in 1922, but much of it was taken by the Museum and Art Gallery. Baskerville's Easy-Hill estate was bought in 1918, the canal wharves off Broad Street were infilled, and the Hall of Memory Gardens were dedicated seven years later. A grandiose design of neo-classical buildings was approved for a new Civic Centre: already outdated when begun in the mid-30's, the scheme will never be completed. 5/8 of Baskerville House was built when World War Two began, and no more has been done. Municipal departments occupy premises in several buildings, adapted or purpose-built, and a single centre may never be achieved.

Pemberton, Rawlinson, Piggot Smith, the Colmores, Adderleys, and Calthorpes, were pioneers in. Birmingham town-planning, Josiah Nettlefold and George Cadbury were the Edwardian leaders. Bournville from 1895, now about 700 acres, and the Harborne Tenants' Estate pre-1914, 54 acres, 500 houses, showed Ebenezer Howard's 'garden city' idea in practice, provided models for municipal estates. Gardens, amenities, tenants' participation in management and upkeep, were the principles. Sutton Estate, a similar private development in Ward End. Ideal Village, neither ideal nor a village, Little Bromwich, Ideal Benefit Society.

1901, Birmingham Housing Committee formed. No intention to rebuild centre slums or develop suburbs municipally. After Housing and Planning Act of 1909, (which produced Yardley's plan for the Cole Walk, later adopted by City), he Committee produced detailed plans for land purchase and guided private development in the newly acquired areas: half of these, in plans of 1913-14, were subject to plans, but the Council had no powers to direct. Quinton, Harborne, Edgbaston, 2320 acres, to be wholly residential. The rural area of North Yardley, 3164 acres, lacked all services but especially communications apart from the railway - one station at Stechford. East Birmingham, 1673 acres, crossed by three rail lines, was largely zoned for housing industry. South Birmingham, 8400 acres, had industry in the north and south-west, but much land was available for housing. The Taylor Estates in Yardley were for sale in 1913, and the Corporation bought most of them. Although radial routes were well-served by trams, there were no circle routes to link the new suburbs. Wide, dual carriageway roads were planned for these and other cross-City routes, tram-tracks on central reservations, open spaces, and artisans' houses at fixed densities. Post-1914 building conformed to the Plans' building-lines.

The Act of 1919 recognised the failure of private developers to provide enough houses to replace slums and offered aid to councils with their own schemes. Birmingham had an actual deficiency of 12,000 houses, and 25,000 needed replacement soon. In the 20 years from 1919 400,000 people were housed, about 50,000 dwellings being built by the Corporation and the same number by private enterprise. The Depression caused a decline in municipal housing, and this did not resurge until after the '35 Act which provided aid for slum-clearance. Private estates were built beside and around the Council houses: the latter were the cottage type copied from the Cadburys, built in multiples, while the mortgaged owner-occupied dwellings were usually semi-detached. Schools, libraries, clinics, and all other services had to be provided at short notice in many new districts which grew between the wars, and the peripheral ones were notably short of shops, churches, community centres. Palatial pubs appeared at all the tram and bus termini, and cinemas proliferated.

In 1935 there were still nearly 40,000 back-to-back houses in Birmingham, these and 10,000 others lacked an individual W.C., while 13,650 houses had no separate water supply. Most of these were in the Inner Ring, where the density of houses was 62 to the acre (not including the industry embedded in these pre-1875 areas). The Middle Ring covered the period 1875-1914, and was characterised by the terrace of narrow tunnel-backs in a wide straight street. There were 100,000 such houses. The Outer Ring, 1919 onwards, was planned: house density was 14 to the acre, gardens, grass verges, and open spaces, dual carriageways (or, more usually, the broad strip of land left for them) eating up the ground spectacularly. By 1939 a third of Birmingham's citizens were living in post.1919 houses.

The municipal estates were laid out in circles, ovals, crescents, to avoid the monotony of Middle Ring terraces. Private building was usually on straight or shallow-curved streets. Some cul-de-sacs were made, but most new streets were through routes like the old lanes between which they had been laid, thus creating a future child safety problem. Rarely a 'village centre' provided, shops and other facilities usually being peripheral. The '30s clearances created one-class districts, e.g. Glebe Farm/Lea Hall: attempts to mix types of tenant were unpopular.