Turves Green

Last updated

Turves Green is an area of Birmingham partly in West Heath and partly in Northfield (the boundary between these two wards runs through Turves Green). In addition the area of Longbridge borders Turves Green. A road with the simple name Turves Green runs through the area.

Contents

Past

In the Mediaeval era Turves Green was considered good grazing, the name originally meant, "turf green" which meant Common land and the land was probably enclosed during the late 1850s. The land remained agricultural till Austin Village was built there during World War I for workers producing munitions in a Longbridge factory. Between the world wars council houses with gardens were built bordering Turves Green mostly on the West Heath side.

Present day

During the 1960s a Council estate was built and Turves was conceived. The area round Fairfax Rd includes, Semi-detached houses, Terraced houses, single story bungalows, and nine ten story Tower blocks. There are also four story maisonettes where one lot of tenant occupy the lower two stories and have two small gardens while a second lot of tenants must climb two flights of stairs to reach their front doors and have balconies instead of gardens. There is a small group of shops on Fairfax Rd including two small supermarkets selling food, also general goods and a furniture clearance store.

A small area of Turves Green remains open without building and Birmingham City Council maintains this as a recreation area. In 2011 Birmingham Council added a children's play area with attractions including a roundabout, swings and an assault course with slides. Turves Green Brook, which is a tributary to the River Rea runs through the recreation area, partly open, partly in culverts. The recreation area consists of mown grass, with a few benches and alongside the brook natural woodland. The woodland looks pleasant, during the spring there are pussy willow, blackthorn and hawthorn which flower in succession. After the willows have finished flowering white flowers of hemlock give the area a deadly beauty in sections which the council leaves unmown. Later in the year Himalayan balsam and bindweed flower there and stinging nettles are prominent. In winter evergreen trees and plants including ivy on deciduous trees provides some greenery together with the grass.

Near the play area on either side of the brook is a small spinney with trees including oaks, larches and other conifers. Residents sometimes use the woodland for recreation but the brook is polluted and there is frequently a noticeable smell. The grassy area is acceptable and residents use it more. In the part of the recreational area nearer to Longbridge is a basketball court and post war private houses border the recreational area there. Older private houses are along Longbridge Lane which borders the top part of the recreational area.

The council estate is socially mixed, some residents face poverty and social exclusion, others enjoy better incomes and some could afford to buy their council houses. Those with jobs are typically skilled or unskilled manual workers. Anti-social behaviour may be reported to Birmingham City Council who endeavour to prevent or reduce it. Overall there are far fewer problems with anti-social behaviour than in many sink estates.

On the road, Turves Green there is a small shopping centre with a Cooperative shop and a Dental technician among others, near those shops are more post-war council houses, maisonettes and flats with further tower blocks. The road, Turves Green has mainly private houses with some two-story private maisonettes and some council properties. Turves Green Boys' School and King Edward VI Northfield School for Girls, both secondary schools and Turves Green Primary School are also all on that road. [1] [2] [3]

Related Research Articles

Northfield, Birmingham Human settlement in England

Northfield is a residential area in outer south Birmingham, England, and near the boundary with Worcestershire. It is also a council constituency, managed by its own district committee. The constituency includes the wards of Kings Norton, Longbridge, Weoley Castle and the smaller ward of Northfield that includes West Heath and Turves Green.

Kings Norton Human settlement in England

Kings Norton, alternatively King's Norton, is an area of Birmingham, England. Historically in Worcestershire, it is also a Birmingham City Council ward within the Government of Birmingham, England. The district lies 6.5 miles south-southwest of Birmingham city centre and is within 1.5 miles of the north Worcestershire border.

Erdington Suburb of Birmingham, England

Erdington is a suburb and ward of Birmingham that is historically part of Warwickshire. It is 5 miles (8 km) northeast of central Birmingham, England and borders Sutton Coldfield. It was also a council constituency, managed by its own district committee. The former council district consisted of the ward of Erdington, and Tyburn,, Stockland Green and Kingstanding, although all of Kingstanding and most of both Tyburn and Stockland Green wards lie outside the historical boundaries of Erdington. Stockland Green was formerly part of Aston, Kingstanding part of Perry Barr and Tyburn partially split between Aston and Hodge Hill. Erdington (ward) was part of the Sutton Coldfield constituency before 1974.

Selly Oak Human settlement in England

Selly Oak is an industrial and residential area in south-west Birmingham, England. The area gives its name to Selly Oak ward and includes the neighbourhoods of: Bournbrook, Selly Park, and Ten Acres. The adjoining wards of Edgbaston and Harborne are to the north of the Bourn Brook, which was the former county boundary, and to the south are Weoley, and Bournville. A district committee serves the four wards of Selly Oak, Billesley, Bournville and Brandwood. The same wards form the Birmingham Selly Oak constituency, represented since 2010 by Steve McCabe (Labour). Selly Oak is connected to Birmingham by the Pershore Road (A441) and the Bristol Road (A38). The Worcester and Birmingham Canal and the Birmingham Cross-City Railway Line run across the Local District Centre.

Rednal Human settlement in England

Rednal is a residential suburb on the south western edge of metropolitan Birmingham, West Midlands, England, 9 miles southwest of Birmingham city centre and forming part of Longbridge parish and electoral ward.

Stirchley is in the south west of Birmingham, England.

West Heath, West Midlands Human settlement in England

West Heath is a residential area of Birmingham, England on the boundary with Worcestershire. Forming the larger part of the ward of Longbridge And West Heath it is situated between Kings Norton, Northfield, Longbridge and Cofton Hackett and lies on traditional heathland formed in the 13th century as part of the Kings Norton manorial lands, and was historically in Worcestershire.

Little Aston Village in Staffordshire, England

Little Aston is a village in Staffordshire, England. It is located within the Lichfield District and is approximately 5 miles (8 km) south of the city of Lichfield. Formerly a separate settlement, it is in modern times contiguous with the built-up area of the neighbouring town of Sutton Coldfield. At the 2011 United Kingdom census the population of Little Aston ward was 2,920 people living in 1,104 households. At the last UK census there were 935 homes in the village, well over 10% of which were multimillion-pound properties, and the village is known for its footballers and successful businesspeople.

Cofton Hackett Human settlement in England

Cofton Hackett is a village and civil parish in the Bromsgrove District of north east Worcestershire, England. It is 10.3 miles (16.6 km) southwest of the city centre of Birmingham and 16 miles (26 km) northeast of Worcester. In 2011, the village had a population of 1,893 but with housing development on the former Austin Rover site, this is expected to double over the five years to 2023. The village is served by two main bus services, these being the X20 and 145/145A operated by National Express and Diamond Bus respectively.

Weoley Castle is a residential suburban district in south-west Birmingham, England. The area is part of the Weoley local authority electoral ward, and also comes under the Northfield local council constituency. The suburb of Weoley Castle is bordered by Selly Oak to the east, Harborne to the north, Bartley Green to the west, and Weoley Hill and Shenley Fields to the south.

Birmingham Northfield (UK Parliament constituency) UK Parliament constituency in England since 1950

Birmingham Northfield is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom since 2019 by Gary Sambrook, a Conservative. It represents the southernmost part of the city of Birmingham.

Longbridge Human settlement in England

Longbridge is an area of Northfield, West Midlands. It is located near the border of Worcestershire in the south-west of Birmingham, England.

King's Norton and Northfield Urban District was a local government administrative district in north Worcestershire, England, from 1898 until 1911. Much of its area was afterwards absorbed into the neighbouring Borough of Birmingham, under the Greater Birmingham Scheme, and now constitutes most of the city's southern and southwestern suburban environs.

Sneyd Green

Sneyd Green is an area in the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. It is in the north-east of the city, approx. 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from Hanley. Sneyd Green borders Smallthorne in the north, Milton in the east, Birches Head in the south, and Cobridge in the west.

Turves Green Boys' School is a secondary school in the West Heath area of Birmingham, England. It is approximately 80 years old. The school is an all-boys school with Technology College and Humanities College status. It received Technology College status in 1995. Approximately one fifth of pupils are on the special needs register. The 2007 OFSTED inspection noted that a very small proportion of pupils were of ethnic minorities. In 1994, 5% of the pupils in the school were of an ethnic minority.

Austin Village

Austin Village is a First World War housing estate of prefabs between Longbridge and Northfield, Birmingham.

Gleadless Valley Human settlement in England

Gleadless Valley is a housing estate and electoral ward of the City of Sheffield in England. The population of the ward at the 2011 Census was 21,089. It lies 2.5 miles (4.0 km) south-southeast of the city centre. Formerly a rural area, Gleadless Valley was developed as a large housing project with around 4000 dwellings by Sheffield City Council between 1955 and 1962. It is an area of undulating land drained by the Meers Brook, which has its source on the high ground in the woodland at Gleadless. Adjacent are Gleadless to the east, Norton to the south-west, Heeley to the west and Arbourthorne to the north.

Public housing in the United Kingdom British government and local authority housing programmes

Public housing provided the majority of rented accommodation in the United Kingdom until 2011 when the number of households in private rental housing surpassed the number in social housing. Houses and flats built for public or social housing use are built by or for local authorities and known as council houses, though since the 1980s the role of non-profit housing associations became more important and subsequently the term "social housing" became more widely used, as technically council housing only refers to housing owned by a local authority, though the terms are largely used interchangeably. Before 1865, housing for the poor was provided solely by the private sector. Council houses were built on council estates, where other amenities, like schools and shops, were often also provided. From the 1950s, blocks of flats and three-or-four-storey blocks of maisonettes were widely built, alongside large developments of terraced housing, while the 1960s and the 1970s saw construction of many high-rise tower blocks. Flats and houses were also built in mixed estates.

King Edward VI Northfield School for Girls is a secondary school located on Turves Green in the Northfield area of Birmingham, in the West Midlands of England.

References

  1. ↑ http://www.brumagem.co.uk/ae_TSpring (season)urves-Green_Birmingham.htm
  2. ↑ "Turves Green/ The Turves Green".
  3. ↑ "Turves Green Primary School, Birmingham: Schools in Birmingham".

Coordinates: 20°10′52″N10°06′40″W / 20.18111°N 10.111°W / 20.18111; -10.111

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.