CLEARING' UP DAMAGED HOMES IN BRITAIN

Chronicle (Levin), 17 June 1946, Page 8

CLEARING' UP DAMAGED HOMES IN BRITAIN

WONDERFUL 35 h.P. MACHINE USED

Houses were demolished in Birm.ngham in fewer minutes than it :akes weeks to build. _ Ten minjtes was the average job for each Dne with a great steel jib sent by ihe Home Office for flnishmg oif what German bombs left undone. Next to an air raid, or artj earthqtiake, it is the ' fastest way on sarth of getting rid of the old to provide raw material for the new. And incidentally, it makes a much tieater j ob than either , for tlrc bricks fall where they are wanted tnstead of being scattered all over the road. The clean-up of the scars of war has started in reaf earnest, motivated by the need of salvagmg as much as possible and getting the Rites ready to build on again; Mulions of good bricks are serving no useful purpose in the walls of bomb-damaged houses which are not worth repairing. Meanv/hile the cry from the new housing estates is for bricks and still more bricks. Fifty per cent of the bricks in the old houses can be used in the new. Spearhead (literally) of the clean-up is 30ft. steel jib weighmebetween three and four tons. At _its business end are three massive chisels. Mounted on a catevpillartrack mechanieal navvy, it goes into action with a 35-h.p. punch. A few well-directed jabs, a cloud oi dust, and a house has gone. The man who works all the lpvers in his glass-fronted c.abin had a ticklish job in Brieht Street, Aston. Six roofiess two-storey houses had to oonip down. They stood betwpen a perfeotly sound house and a gar den. Obviously there must be no mis-hit to damage the tenanted house, and not a bi'ick must fall m tbp garden. To make matters more difficult the street was rather narpow for the monster to work, and the backs of the doomed house, q were rather olose to otlmr propertA Every jab hit the walls plumu on the foreman's target. And apart from a child of about three years who sat on the doorstep the occupants of the tenanted house were not sufficiently perturbed at the "next door" being knocked down to come out and see what was hap1 a few hundred yards away stands a pile of about 400 tons of bvicks. Thev were the walls of nine houses in Grosvenor Road. All nine were completely demolished mside 50 minutes. ' Mechanicai navvies follow up tn? dcmolition. The bricks are nioved to corporation dumps where the good are sorted from the bioken. Even the latter become raw material again. They go to form the hard core of the new roads on temporary housing estates. The good bricks are bought by the corporation from the home Office (which becomes the owner oi oroperty scheduled as total loss after the owner has been paid War Damage compensation) at a hgniwhich shows a saving of over 3-0s a thousand. Most of the timber and slates that can be used agam have already been salved from war dam-a8ThS-hundred Birmingham youths have joined the scheme foi week-ehd . depaolition woi'k tane later evehings) on cleaiung; boiiin, ed sites. A start is to be rnade n Loxton Street, and the Publu Works Committee will provide equipment.