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In the north of England there are many houses, indeed whole streets, which have fallen into neglect and ruin for many reasons (see link) including depopulation and people’s desire to live in more upmarket housing. It appears that many of those “Coronation Street” style back-to-backs are likely to be
demolished. Why waste this valuable housing stock? Many country cottages today are in fact two or more hovels knocked together. Why not do the same with terraces? Two, three or more pokey two-up two-downs could be knocked together to create spacious comfortable, if a little quirky, living quarters and would exude the cosy charm of a Hovis advert.
The problem
http://news.bbc.co....uk_news/2136114.stm
[Gordon Comstock, Oct 17 2004]
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Some relatives of mine live in
4 16th century cottages which
have been converted into one
dwelling - not quite what you're
describing, but similar. One
side-effect is that you still get
fairly small rooms and low
ceilings.
The problem with
converting the houses you
describe is that because of their
location no house built where they
are is going to be worth very
much, so even if you cut costs by
converting multiple houses into
one (as opposed to rebuilding) the
resale price will be lower
than your costs. |
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[hippo] I'd agree with you if you were to just create one such house in a run-down terrace. But if several roads were all converted like this, you could rejuvenateve the area as has been done in the docks in Manchester and Newcastle. As these houses were built for workers, they are often in good locations in relation to other renewed factories, mills etc which have since been converted to offices and the like. |
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was 'Help' the Beatles first film? I believe they half-baked this in one scene. |
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No, 'Hard Days Night' - one of them anyway. |
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It would be cool if you could keep the original numbers - "Yeah, I live at 16 - 22 King St". |
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There have been attempts to merge adjacent houses in the UK that failed in the sense that the owner still had to pay council tax for each house. |
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I supppose it depends on the area. The terrace houses round where i come from are actually bigger than the new houses being thrown up by mr. barret and friends everywhere. They also have walls made of brick and not plaster board and more spacious rooms with higher ceilings. I like this idea a lot as I would rather eat a turd than live in one of those new "des reses".
Another difference between the new houses and the terraces is that you can get hold of a terrace for under 30 grand and you wont get a sniff at a new one for under 70. |
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Also, in my home town, many of the terraces are v. near the town centre. As far as I know, there is no problem with them being uninhabited. Far from it in fact. |
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As po vaguely remembers, famously Baked in "Help!" |
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My suspicion is that the construction quality is probably just too poor to make it worth keeping the building shells, whatever you do to the insides. My family fought a constant battle with rising damp: even though we installed proper ventilation and a damp-proof course, the damp would seep over from the neighbour's houses. And we had a double brick cavity wall - many terrace houses have only single thickness walls. |
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Having said that, I am very much in favor of urban renewal, so croissant. |
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- pokey: desciptive of cramped,
possibly gloomy space.
-
two-up, two-down: traditional
small terraced house with two
rooms upstairs and two rooms
downstairs (and an outside loo),
built between about 1880 and
1914 in vast numbers in the UK. |
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Suggested Category - Public: Architecture: House |
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I certainly applaud the intent. But this isn't exactly a new and revolutionary halfbakery sort of idea, as I see it. This kind of thing is commonly done. You just want them to do it there. |
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