New homes planned in street where subsidence led to demolition of houses

Norwich City Council has unveiled plans to build 14 properties in Argyle Street, off Rouen Road - an area council bosses have long wanted to redevelop after the previous homes were knocked down.

That saga was the second time in recent decades that the street has made headlines. In the 1980s, it was home to Britain's longest running squat and became known as the Republic of Argyle Street.

After the squatters were evicted, the original homes were demolished in 1985 and new properties built.

However some of those buildings lasted only 30 years and were knocked down in 2015, having been empty and boarded up for six years.

The council had moved its tenants out of some of its properties - 16 flats and three bungalows - in 2009, after tests showed the buildings were at risk of subsidence, with cracks appearing in some of them.

Tenants who were moved out were eligible for home-loss payments of around £5,000 to £6,000.

An overgrown, boarded up and fenced off house in Argyle Street. pictured in 2014, before the demolition. (Image: Archant)

City Hall has now submitted plans to its own planning department to rebuild homes on the site - believing a solution has been found to get around the area's history of subsidence.

The council has worked with Ludham-based architects WT Design to come up with a scheme for 14 homes on the street.

Surveys have established that chalk tunnels, dug for mining, run under the site, but experts are confident they can build homes there despite that.

To address the ground condition issues, deep piled foundations for the buildings' walls and floors would be taken into the chalk bedrock and past any tunnels and unstable material.

The proposed properties for the street vary from one bedroom flats to four-bedroom houses, ranging from two to three storeys high.

An artist's impression of how the redevelopment of Argyle Street in Norwich could look. (Image: WT Design)

The one-bedroom flats would be in a three storey block.

All the properties would be available for social rent from the council.

Norwich city councillor Gail Harris. (Image: Norwich Labour Party)

Gail Harris, deputy leader of Labour-controlled Norwich City Council and cabinet member for social housing, said: "I think this is really exciting. It's important that we build new social housing right across the city.

"With this scheme, we are looking to build them based on Passivhaus principles, with heat source pumps, solar panels and electric charging points.

"We like to build houses and we like those houses to be good quality ones."

The proposals are likely to come before the council's planning committee in May.

The Republic of Argyle Street

Argyle Street made national headlines at the end of the 1970s, when it became home to Britain's longest running squat.

Squatters are evicted from Argyle Street in 1985. (Image: Archant Library)

The majority of two-up/two-down terraced houses in the King Street and Ber Street area had been demolished in a radical 1950s city council clearance scheme.

There was a move for the university to buy the surviving terraced houses, such as those in Argyle Street, from the council for student accommodation.

But those plans fell through and 120 squatters moved in to the empty houses, forming a co-operative and seeking financial aid from the government.

In 1981, a £1m renovation grant was agreed but the following year council proposals to sell or lease the site to the co-operative were blocked.

And in 1985, the so-called 'Republic of Argyle Street' members were evicted and the bulldozers quickly demolished the homes, with new properties built in their place.

Graffiti in Argyle Street in 1985. (Image: Archant Library)