• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team

Gas Holders in Birmingham

norfolk brummie

gone but not forgotten
Those old gas holders, were large, smelly, dirty, very necessary, but wonderful looking installations, usually built in pairs, many with in built Victorian design and architecture as a prominent feature of the holder.

Probably the most famous is the gasholder at the London, Oval cricket ground, but here in Norwich they have preserved one very fine holder.

My question is: Have any gasholders been preserved in Birmingham? I recall seeing many of them in my youth, but cannot remember where, in Birmingham.

I would hope that someone has saved photographs of these installations.

Eddie
 
Last edited:
Last edited:
I painted this watercolour of Saltly Gas works looking from Nechells Place from a members old black and white pic some time ago (using my memory for colour). Gas works long since gone. Can remember collecting coke in a barrow from here in the 40's and 50's. EricNechells Place.jpg
 
oldMohawk:

Many thanks for those wonderful aerial views of Norwich, and the gasholders in particular. It is the black gas holder on the right, in each photograph, that has been preserved, and the ironwork is currently painted white. The housing around it has been completely demolished, and rebuilt, into modern apartments, and ultra modern three story homes.

Incidentally, we live quite close to Blickling Hall, also shown, the ancestral home of Anne Boleyn. Not so much Birmingham history, as English history. .

Eddie
 
Last edited:
hi folks does anyone know where i can find the original black and white photo of nechells place please...

lyn
 
Lyn, that's the one I painted from, it's was on the No. 8 Inner Circle bus route, have passed down there many time, all gone now though, mores the pity
 
I have photos from back in 2010.

These ones near Nechells / Saltley / Washwood Heath may have been demolished by now.



The Aston Gas Holders I think are still there (for now)

 
thanks ell yes they are still there but will soon become a thing of the past...

lyn
 
Maybe it is easier to keep them there as a reminder that clean up the contamination - if any -beneath them? Presumably only the metal framing exists as I doubt there is any gas holding facilities now?
 
I have a feeling that planning permision has been granted to demolish them this year.

thanks for that mort...i know that unlike buildings they cant be put to a useful purpose but they have been a part of the skyline for many years...be strange not to see them

lyn
 
Back
Top