The rise and spectacular fall of the 'high-rise estate in the countryside' demolished in seconds
24.06.2023 - 05:35
/ manchestereveningnews.co.uk
It took just eight and a half seconds and half a ton of explosives. In 1990, Kersal Flats entered the Guinness Book of Records as the largest building demolished at one time.
But just 30 years earlier the vast high-rise estate was being hailed as the future of housing in Salford, with flats there among the most sought after council tenancies in the city. It was a spectacular fall from grace.
Kersal Flats were designed by Deansgate-based architects firm Cruickshank and Seaward, the firm behind the Renold Building at UMIST and the old Elizabeth House on St Peter's Square. Built at a cost of £1.7m - around £32m at today's prices - it was the largest housing project in Salford's history.
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Construction began in 1958 and was completed two years later, before being officially opened on March 2, 1962 by then Labour leader Hugh Gaitskell. Each of the 12 blocks were named after famous poets, including Shakespeare, Chaucer, Browning, Keats and Milton, with the nine and 11-storey towers housing a total of almost 750 flats.
The estate even had its own clinic, six shops including a butchers, greengrocers, chemist and hardware store, playground and a pub, The Castle, which was opened in 1971 by Jimmy Savile. Specially-made rooms were set aside on each landing for the storage of coal.
And because the site close to the old racecourse had been subject to flooding, the flats were built on stilts, creating rooms underneath which were earmarked for laundries and children's play areas. And initially the flats were wildly popular.
Dr Shane Sullivan, a legal academic, was born there in 1969 and spent the first 10 years of his life in a three bed flat on the seventh