Swanshurst Quarter in 1979

The Quarter has even less unity now than it ever had, and only the need to keep this booklet to a reasonable size justifies studying its modern state in isolation from neighbouring districts. Development was apparently nearing completion four decades ago, but that was by the standards of that time. Pressure of population has - until the last few years, when economic stagnation and birth-rate decline have changed everything - brought the disappearance of many pieces formerly open space beneath tarmac, concrete, and brick. Map 12 illustrates this very clearly. Nurseries, private playing fields, tennis courts, brookside meadows, wasteland borders, mansion grounds, and enclosed bits made accessible by the demolition of a semi or two and filled with a cul-de-sac of 'town houses', have produced a concentration of housing that would had horrified the generous planners of the twenties.

The Quarter's four cinemas have closed, the Piccadilly after a brief spell as Dreamland, showing Indian films. The Springfield is a furniture store, the Rialto and Robin Hood are replaced by supermarkets. Most of the Edwardian mansions have gone. Court Road's small fire station has closed following the building of a big new one at the top corner of Swanshurst Park. Hall Green's villa police station is no more. Since '74 police, fire, and health services, and road maintenance have been controlled by the West Midlands County. The Webb Lane factories have been rebuilt. The Women's Hospital is threatened with closure. Four Arches Bridge was restored in '56, and Sarehole Mill in '69. Warstock Allotments are overbuilt, as is half of the Springfield tract; the rest is a 'leisure garden' (a tidied-up allotment patch). Two Circle intersections - Stoney Lane / Walford Road and Colebank / School Roads - have been straightened, and Priory Road is dualled almost to the boundary. But elsewhere only service roads have been made along the green swaths, and now the W. M. C. has decided to abandon the dual carriageway plan of a half-century ago. Hall Green has its library and St. Peter's Church off Highfield Road, both from the swinging sixties.

Designated open spaces survive, and prefabs are not to be replaced on park edges by towers as we once feared. Sarehole Mill Meadow and the play-space by Marion Way (Foster Bequests), and the 1913 Hougham Bequest land from Green Road ford to Stratford Road have been added to the Coleside amenity; there is a regretted break in the walk between Brook Lane and the Mill, because of the schools' field, but the well- beaten track parallel to Old Wake Green Road's trees shows that the peasantry are establishing a right of way thereabout. Coldbath Brook has been culverted from the Pool eastward, and beyond the site of Lady Mill there is a great underground stormwater reservoir. The Dell is encroached upon from both sides, by St. Bernard's School and private cul-de-sacs. South of Scribers Lane the Coleside level has been raised. The remaining part of Yardley Wood Common is under threat of development.

Surviving antiquities (pre-1850) are: The Chalet in Green Road, Sarehole Mill, Sarehole Farm outbuildings, Yew Tree Cottage and Showell Green Cottages, Yew Tree Farm, The Firs, Moorlands, Paradise Cottages, Highfield House, and Four Arches & Titterford Bridges. Losses since World War II include both Springfields, Spartans, Cateswell, Sarehole Hall, Coldbath Farm, Showellhurst, Trittiford House. Early council houses are being modernised, as are many terraces.

Only the oldest rows at the Quarter's north end can be described as sub-standard dwellings. Recent immigrants - Irish, European, West Indian, Asian - outnumber existing residents in the terrace streets north of the Council House - still proudly displaying its Y. D. C. shields - and are rapidly growing in numbers in Springfield. Sparkhill shop centre is Asianised; and many old-established stores have closed or changed function. Springfield and Hall Green have still flourishing shopping rows. Much of the Quarter is still a very pleasant place to live, if increasingly dangerous for children and pedestrians.