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Bartley Green
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Bartley Green is a residential suburban area and electoral ward to the south west of Birmingham city centre, England. The ward is part of the Edgbaston constituency which has been under Labour rule for almost ten years. It is located in the metropolitan county of the West Midlands and was in the historic county of Worcestershire. Located to the east is the Weoley ward, to the south is Frankley and to the west is the county of Worcestershire. To the north is Woodgate Valley Country Park.
The ward is served by , which opened in 1905, on Adams Hill. Another library is available in the Newman University College.
History Bartley Green was first noted in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Berchelai. This means either the birch tree wood or the clearing in the birch trees (from the Old English "beorc leah"). Bartley Green was in the possession of the manor of Weoley. Bartley Green was again mentioned in 1657, however, this time it was under its current name. Most of the land occupied by Bartley Reservoir was in the parish of Northfield, Birmingham, originally in Worcestershire. It was transferred to Warwickshire when Northfield became part of Birmingham in November 1911.
However, the south-west end of the reservoir overlapped into the parish of Frankley, in Worcestershire. In April 1995, part of Frankley (including the south-west part of Bartley Reservoir) was transferred to Birmingham and became part of the West Midlands county.
St. Michael and All Angels church is located within Bartley Green. It was built as a chapel of ease to St. Laurence, Northfield. Construction of the church commenced in 1838 and was consecrated in 1848. At the time was a small L-shaped, Gothic building. It was enlarged in 1878 with the addition of sanctuary and chancel. In 1933, it became a chapel of ease to St. Gabriel, Weoley Castle. A Conventional district was attached to St. Michael's in 1950, which became a parish in 1966. The church was demolished in 1968 after standing derelict for around two years. A new church was constructed in the ward in 1964 to a design by H Norman Haines of London on Romsley Lane. The church was built on the site of a school which had closed in 1954. The site was given to the church by the Birmingham Corporation in 1964. In 1977, St Francis Church Centre was constructed in the Glenside area of Bartley Green. They are both part of the Diocese of Birmingham.
St. Michael and All Angels church produced a newsletter named "The Parish Messenger" which recorded the activities of the church. It was published twice a month from 1947 until October 1951 where it was published monthly. Publishing stopped in 1956. The "Bartley Green Pictorial" was first published in September 1967 and existed until 1975.
Politics Bartley Green is part of the Edgbaston Constituency of Birmingham. It is represented by Bavarian-born Labour MP Gisela Stuart, who has held the seat since 1997, replacing Dame Jill Knight in the year of Tony Blair's landslide victory. Unlike any other UK constituency, Edgbaston has had a female Member of Parliament since 1953.
In the 2005 General Election, Gisela held her seat with a decreased majority of 2,349: a -5.3% swing, winning ahead of the Conservative candidate Deirdre Alden, Mike Dixon of the Liberal Democrats, Peter Green of the Green Party and Stephen White of United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP).
Like other wards within the Edgbaston constituency such as Harborne and the Edgbaston ward itself, Bartley Green is a safe Conservative ward at Birmingham City Council level, with all three serving councillors - John Lines, Vivienne Barton and Bruce Lines - representing the party.
The ward has adopted a Ward Support Officer, with the current holder of the status being Tina Willetts.
Demography The 2001 Population Census found that 25,473 people lived in Bartley Green with a population density of 2,807 people per km˛ compared with 3,649 people per km˛ for Birmingham. Bartley Green has an area of 7.8 km˛/ 885.6 hectares. The ward had a female proportion of 53.2%, above the city average of 51.6% and the national average of 51.3%. The male population represented 46.8% of the population total.
The ward is not an ethnically diverse area as 9.6% (2,446) of the ward's population represent ethnic minorities, compared with 29.6% for Birmingham. 6.2% of the population was born outside the United Kingdom, below the national average of 9.3%. The White British ethnic group was the largest at 87%, equal to that of the national average. Black Caribbean was the second largest at 3%. 73.5% of the population stated themselves as Christian, above the national average of 71.7%. 14.6% stated they were of no religion, equal to that of the national average.
98.8% of the population lived in households, above the city and national averages of 98.3% and 98.2% respectively. 1.2% lived in communal establishments. A total of 11,160 households in the ward are occupied resulting in an average of 2.3 people living in each house. This is below the city average of 2.5 and national average of 2.4. 49.9% of the occupied households are occupied by the owner, below the city average of 60.4%. 37.3% of the occupied households are rented from Birmingham City Council, above the city average of 19.4%. 394 households were stated as being vacant. The most common form of housing in the ward is terraced housing with 35% of all houses being terraced. 32.6% of houses were stated as being semi-detached. A high proportion of the housing stock in the ward was constructed after 1945 (98.8%) compared with a city average of 67.4%. Much of the housing is now in poor condition.
The ward currently ranks in the top 7% in terms of deprivation on Government indices. 16.9% were of a pensionable age, compared with 16.7% for the city and 18.4% for the country. 60.1% of the population was of a working age, above the city average at 59.8% and below the national average of 61.5%. The largest age group was 25-44 at 27.3%. 10.2% of the population is unemployed, of which 36.5% are in long term unemployment. 18.1% of the Bartley Green working population worked in the manufacturing sector. The largest employer organisation in the ward was identified by the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce as Birmingham Accord Ltd., a construction firm that employs approximately 600 people.
Claim to fame Bartley Reservoir is a reservoir for drinking water. It covers 46 hectares of countryside and it is well known as the place where Bill Oddie did much of his early birdwatching, and features in his books (notably Bill Oddie's Gone Birding) and television programmes. His first ever published article, for the West Midland Bird Club's annual report, was about the birds of the reservoir.
The reservoir is also used by a local sailing club and nearby schools and activity clubs frequently visit to take part in watersports activities such as sailing and canoeing.
Jane Bunford, the tallest person ever to have lived in the United Kingdom, who reached a height of , lived in Bartley Green until her death at her home on 1 April 1922. Her hair also measured .
Sport Bartley Green has produced sportsmen and women including Fliss Johnson, a former pupil of Woodgate Primary School, who became the English Ladies Amateur Golf Champion in May 2005 and won the BBC Midlands Sports Woman of the Year Award. Bartley Green F.C. are a successful football club based in the ward and are members of the Midland Combination Premier Division. There are at least five amateur football teams in the area; Bartley Revolution FC, Bartley Green Blades, Angels F.C., Bartley Green Falcons and the Rea Valley Colts. Bartley Green Leisure Centre is the local leisure centre. The Judo club based in Bartley Green meets at the nearby Shenley Court Community Leisure Centre in Northfield.
Schools and education Bartley Green National School opened in 1840 as a Sunday school. The site was subsequently enlarged and the school rebuilt in 1871. By 1872, there were two departments for mixed and infant children. A new infants school opened in 1881 on a site to the north of the church. The school was reorganised in 1931 into a single department for junior mixed and infant children aged 5 - 9˝ years. Children aged 9˝ and over were transferred to Bartley Green Council School. In 1951, the school was again reorganised for infant children only. It closed in 1954 on the opening of St. Michael's C.E. Primary School. The last headteacher of the primary school, Lily C. Treadwell, was transferred to St. Michael's C.E. Primary School to become it's first headteacher.
Bartley Green Council School opened in 1914 replacing Woodgate Council School. It was reorganised in 1931 for Senior Mixed and again in 1951 for Junior Mixed. The school closed in 1953 when the pupils transferred to Woodgate County Primary School.
Primary schools There are eight primary schools located within the Bartley Green ward. As part of the Bartley Green Action Plan, all primary schools were given golf facilities. , , St. Michael's C.E. Junior and Infant School and St. Peter's R.C. School all had golf courses constructed within their school grounds for the pupils.
Secondary schools was granted technology status in 2000 and has 848 pupils on roll. 61% of pupils are boys and 12.3% of pupils come from ethnic minorities. Half of these pupils from ethnic minorities are from the Black Caribbean ethnic group.
A survey conducted by the Department of Applied Social Studies and Social Research in 1998, concluded that "52.4% of pupils at Bartley Green Specialist Technology and Sports College live in 40% of the Birmingham Enumeration Districts with the highest proportion of the population dependent on income support. Around half of the pupils at the school live in the Bartley Green ward, and 22.9% live in the Weoley and Longbridge wards. All of these wards have urban deprivation scores considerably above the Birmingham average, which itself is far higher than the national average."
was opened as Bartley Green Grammar School for Girls on 7 September 1954, though the official opening by Sir Wilfred Martineau did not take place until 13 July 1955. The sixth form centre was set up by the turn of the 1960s. The school was considerably extended and expanded in the 1970s to accommodate with the increase in pupil intake. The school was renamed Hillcrest School and Sixth Form Centre in September 1983 and dropped its grammar school status. It faced closure during the 1980s, however, it remained open following a campaign by the school. Boys were allowed to join the sixth form during the 1980s. Following further work at the school in 1998, the school became a Certified Cisco Networking Academy in 1999.
King Edward VI Five Ways moved to the area from Five Ways in 1958, however, retained the name. Having introduced girls in the years following 1998, today Five Ways is the largest co-educational state grammar school in the West Midlands, and one of the top five co-educational grammar schools nationally.
The largest secondary school in Bartley Green is in Shenley Lane. It was constructed in 1963 and has approximately 1,650 pupils on role. It has Specialist Performing Arts College status as well as sixth form centre. The school is also the fourth largest employer based in the ward.
Colleges - Newman University College
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