Our disappearing fields: end of an era – beginning of a new one?

It wasn’t so long ago that we posted about GE Brown’s bus, coach and garage business, which was, at one time, based at his Chesterfield Road site. Now his former premises are being demolished, for use as the entrance to a controversial housing development.

The multi-faceted Brown (watch and cycle repairs, motor mechanic, bus and coach operator and garage owner) who lived, for a time in the terraced house next to the parish church yard on Church Street, was chronicled in our earlier blog.  He was, apparently, quite a character.

But his garage, former petrol filling station and operating base has, probably by the time you read this, been reduced to rubble. Demolition started on 4 October 2021, with arrival of site cabins. By the day after, asbestos roofing sheets were being removed from the metal framed building.

This heralds construction of a permanent entrance highway to the planned development of 150 houses on a field behind the garage site, heading up to Northmoor View (off Manor Road. Though there is no planned vehicular access from Northmoor View. The developers are the Vistry Group.

This plan and a previous one for more housing, have been controversial, with a campaign mounted against them. The plan for 150 houses had been approved on appeal in 2019.

The former Brown premises, for many years a car sales unit, was finally vacated during the summer of 2020. The final business to operate from the Chesterfield Road site – ‘Riverside Cars’ – relocated to Storforth Lane.

Archaeological trial excavations on the development site field had identified a number of features, including field systems dating to the Romano-British and Medieval periods along with industrial activity. A condition imposed as part of the planning permission will see a more comprehensive archaeological excavation on the site. Obviously, as a local history group, we are looking forward to this happening, which may considerably enhance our knowledge of Romano-British and Medieval periods in Brimington. Herras security fencing being erected on part of the field may be a precursor to the archaeological investigation stating, but we’ll be keeping a close eye on this.

Like many others we are concerned that the already busy Chesterfield Road will have issues with yet more traffic on it. The loss of green-fields, that cannot be replaced, is also regrettable, but may herald a new era in understanding our local history.

Once the homes are constructed, they will, of course, also herald a new era for their owners.

We’ll be keeping a close eye on developments and keeping you posted, particularly as the archaeological excavations progress.