Marshworth:Milton Keynes

MKDC flyer

BACKGROUND & HISTORY

Once the final decision had been taken in 21^st January 1967, to create Milton Keynes – as a new city for more than 100,000 inhabitants rather than just another new town – the rush was on for the new Milton Keynes Development Corporation (MKDC) to build the hundreds of homes needed for those who, in turn, would build the city itself.

The immediate result, with building starting in 1970, was the creation of a crescent of new council estates across Woughton parish. Although designed by the MKDC's own leading architects, these council houses followed the style of the times; with long rows of identical houses which are in retrospect now seen to be most redolent of quasi-military barracks, of the sort that the Russians foisted onto East Berlin’s Stalinallee, rather than comfortable domestic architecture! The best example of what this led to can perhaps be seen in the rows of three storey houses in Netherfield.

However, in some respects this criticism, retrospectively applying the standards of another time, is unfair. They were merely following the fashion of the time, when so many tall towers of council flats were built elsewhere soon to be demolished as unlivable in. That fate did not come to these Milton Keynes houses. Indeed - despite the cost limitations imposed by the Conservative government - they were well built, albeit in new materials, with large rooms were then demanded  - in the Parker Morris standards – for council accommodation. Despite the widespread rumours amongst their tenants, there is no evidence that they were ever intended to be temporary buildings. The reason they were built in these materials not brick was simply that the government's 'Housing Yardstick', for public housing, was deliberately skewed to favor dense development; where MK's housing was - even on the original estates - low density. Accordingly resources were very tightly stretched. Even so, despite the new materials they have lasted remarkably well over the past 35 years; where 25 years is often reckoned to be the life of such a building and – faced with savage cutbacks in government funding – the council was never allowed to put in place adequate maintenance schedules.

Tinker’s Bridge was part of the second phase. A smaller estate, with single-pitched roofs and a more intimate layout though still featuring the use of modern materials on their facias, it was viewed at the time – at least by the residents of existing estates – as somewhat ‘up-market’.

Marshworth (in the foreground) and Tinker's Bridge (to the right)

when built and before the planting softened the outlines

Around 1970/1971, the exact details were lost when English Partnerships chose to destroy the archives of the Development Corporation, it was decided that there was also a need for homes to be built for increasing numbers of professionals and managers at the helm of the Development Corporation itself. Accordingly Marshworth, a small estate based on a single road, was started. As a result, some time in 1973, the new bungalows were completed and occupied.

Perhaps understandably, where this occurred at a time when there were no private houses being built in Milton Keynes, the Development Corporation felt that it needed to develop this site itself. Whatever the reason, this was in fact the only development ever undertaken by the Development Corporation itself, and all later developments were handled by private developers! In this context, and rather strangely, in the absence of the destroyed archives English Partnerships - the inheritors of the Development Corporation’s mantle – now seem to think that the developer was Lawrie Jones Ltd. Of High Wycombe. As the deeds and land registration clearly show that the Development Corporation was acting on its own behalf, it has to be assumed that Lawrie Jones was instead the chosen builder.

Whatever the exact legal arrangements, the Development Corporation clearly set out to make these ‘executive homes’ as desirable as possible. Indeed they were designed in house by their own architect, and his team, to be a flagship development for the new city. Not least, some of the middle and senior managers of the Development Corporationwere later to live in these bungalows. It is not surprising, therefore, that they threw into the mix everything needed to make it a highly desirable estate.

Full details were incorporated in the Development Corporations flyer at the time (double click here to transfer to this)

In particular, at a time when council estates were rigorously separated from private housing, they arranged for this development to be physically separated from the rest of Tinker’s Bridge; from the council estate built slightly later. They did not go as far as the later residents of Passmore, whose estate did not even share any road links with it and who refused to accept that they were part of the same block, but a discrete gap was left and small hills or large mounds, covered by trees, were put in place in this gap. Furthermore, although Marshworth’s  own recreation area was in theory accessible to everyone, the ways through to it were very discrete and out of the way so that ‘aliens’ were discouraged. The most obvious route, the canal towpath, was though on the other side; in effect separated by a moat. Privacy was the watchword for the new estate.

Above all, though, the bungalows ‘faced’ onto this open space and the canal – albeit, very privately, via their rear gardens. Indeed the Development Corporation at the time, promoting this flagship development, graphically described the estate as ‘canal-side executive homes’.

The biggest bonus for the new owners was, though, the amount of space provided. The smallest plot was around a sixth of an acre and the largest was a quarter of an acre; massive in comparison with all but a few of the millionaire’s houses built later in Milton Keynes. This gave an overall ration of something like five to the acre, at a time when most similar estates in the South East, for example the critically well received work of the Wates family, were being built ten to the acre. It most tellingly compares with the latest phase in Milton Keynes, the expansion towards ½ million population, which must be built at ratios in excess of 20 to the acre!

Link detached houses on the Wates estate in Molesey, Surrey

The biggest bonus of all, still appreciated by current residents, was the ‘semi-private’ public space in effect reserved for use by them. With the barrier in front and the open space to the rear, this meant that the overall site was some ten acres; giving 0.4 acres of total space to each of the 22 bungalows. Indeed, had normal planning considerations been applied, and even allowing for the usual trade offs, the bungalows would not have been ‘staggered’ to ensure privacy, but would have lined up along the road; allowing perhaps another 50% of homes to be accommodated. Even more illuminating, the space given to the open space could have been halved; allowing perhaps three times as many bungalows to have been built. The planners were remarkably generous to the future owners – the professionals they sought to attract, including their colleagues!

Send mail to mercerdavids@aol.com with questions or comments about this web site.
Last modified: 01/26/06