I never quite understood post-war housing policy of destroying perfectly good housing to build council estates (as opposed to repairing and renovating). It is difficult to tell from the photo, but it appears to me that only the Tyneham Close Estate was a consequence of bombing, with the Wycliffe Road, Ashley Crescent and Gideon Road Estates the result of deliberate clearance and rebuilding.

Certainly in the case of Wycliffe and Wickersley Roads the five or so remaining houses on each would suggest that the buildings that were destroyed by a post-war council were perfectly adequate. I would guess that the number of houses destroyed and number built were roughly equal (I know other blocks in the borough which saw more homes demolished than were created, and the new flats obviously lacked their own gardens, and had no potential for extension or conversion). It would not surprise me to discover that the net effect of purpose built council housing in London has actually been to lower population density.

Even when you consider the political motives to socialise housing and improve the lot of the average tenant it’s hard to understand why some estates were built seemingly without thought for human nature. Ashley Crescent (the block mentioned to the east of Gideon Road) is a case in point, the internal communal areas are incredibly dark and have little natural light towards the rare and the layout is such that, if someone tried to build it now, we’d be having words with the developer to get them to improve natural surveillance and use. And while I know people there who do love their homes, I also know that several share your views on the layout.

…when I referred to the geographically challenged Stormont Road / Gideon Road corner, I of course meant the Stormont Road / Gowrie road corner…

I always assumed it all got bombed, and whatever was built to replace them had to be cheap, so some plans were photocopied of whatever ‘estate’ they had pre-designed that just about fitted the space. But this rather knocks that theory.

There’s another interesting set on the small estate on the Stormont Road / Gideon Road corner – which has the same design as Dawes Road estate. The estate is the right size and shape for a bombsite infill – indeed the low-rise estate is still bookended by the two ends of the large Victorian terrace that used to connect; I assumed that the gap had been patched up. But looking at the 1945 Google photo, which is presumably post-war, the old Victorian houses are clearly still there.

Which opens up a bit of a mystery: for some reason, at some point post-war, the Council decided to knock down most (but not all) of an existing terrace of 4-storey houses, and replace it with a similar terrace of 2-storey houses. This has intrigued me – something must have been *very* wrong with one half of the terrace to go to all that expense… It is possible that the aerial photos were before the end of the bombing, but this seems unlikely, as why would you do a reconstruction survey (presumably the purpose of the comprehensive aerial photography) while still at war? Hmm.