Changes
I am very grateful to Patrick Hemphill, of the Local History Society, for providing me with these photos of
some of the new housing which is going up around the village.
The corner where Flax Lane meets Egremont Street has been an eyesore for a long time, ever since the original
garage of Harry S. Lee
was demolished for redevelopment.
The deterioration of the site and the neglected appearance of the former Penny's Shop next door combined to make the
area look
very run down.
Even allowing for the moiré pattern that the brickwork produces (sorry about that - nothing I can do),
I think the improvement brought about by the new houses is undeniable.
That being said, there are still question marks over the density of the new housing, the effect on
traffic and the visual "enclosure" that has occurred.
Meanwhile, on Bells Lane, the site of the Suffolk Glass factory
has been transformed by the construction of some, it has to be said, imaginatively-designed properties which integrate well with the
19th Century Industrial splendour of the old Horsehair Factory.While such housing might not be to everyone's taste, at least some thought
has gone into fitting the new properties into their surroundings, and they do not dwarf completely the older properties.
I could, however, take exception to the colour of the tiles on the roofs of the outer buildings, which echoes the travesty of "public loo" design
they were allowed to get away with on Fair Green a few years back. What is wrong with slate? or at least tiles of a more neutral colour?
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Flax Lane, Egremont Street and Bells Lane |
