Over the period 2007-2012 Rochdale Council and Rochdale Boroughwide Housing are working together to invest up to £9,500,000 to improve the environments on the borough’s council estates in a project named “Creating Great Neighbourhoods”.  

Through this project we are making our estates safer and more secure, more attractive and better places to live. This is being achieved through a variety of environmental projects. On the one hand there are the “Quick Wins” or smaller scale schemes that target specific problems that a relatively small investment might be able to tackle, whilst on the other hand there are the “Priority Estates” where much larger scale works are being undertaken to address larger scale problems.

Quick Wins

Priority Estates

Progress of Priority Estates Work

Quick Wins

The Quick Wins schemes are those schemes that can be undertaken relatively quickly anywhere in the borough to address particular problems that tenants, councillors, officers, etc have brought to our attention. Each Township i.e. Rochdale North, Rochdale South, Pennies, Middleton & Heywood has a budget allocated to it based on the number of council properties located there and such schemes are approved by RBH’s Area Panels which meet quarterly.

The maximum value of a Quick Win is £35,000 though many such schemes have cost only a few hundred pounds to carry out. Examples of the types of schemes that fall under the banner of Quick Wins include hard and soft landscaping, parking schemes, lighting upgrades, fencing renewals or refurbishments, providing or replacing security doors, carrying out basic highway safety projects e.g. erecting bollards and replacing items of play equipment. To date over 300 Quick Wins schemes have been carried out in close consultation with affected tenants and residents, councillors and officers.

Below are “before and after” photos of two of the Quick Wins

The above pictures are of upgraded front garden areas to some flats on Meadow View, Cutgate whilst the ones below show an improved parking facility on Holborn Gardens, Brimrod.

Priority Estates

The other element of the Creating Great Neighbourhood Project is the work we carry out to the so-called Priority Estates which were determined in 2006 by a detailed Environmental Audit that was undertaken by Rochdale Council’s Implementation Planning Team and approved by both the Council and RBH. This audit analysed each of the borough’s estates by looking at such things as street lighting, footpaths, signage, open space, parking, house curtilages and fencing. A score was then given to each estate and the estates which were deemed to have the worst environments scored the most marks.

Each Township was then allocated a budget and the estates which had the highest scores in terms of the poor quality of their environment was designated a Priority Estate. There are around four Priority Estates per Township Area and these are listed at the end together with any completed works.

The Environmental Steering Group, which is made up of five tenant representatives (one from each Township) is responsible for the implementation and the monitoring of the Priority Estates work. These representatives are Joan Turner (Rochdale North), Debbie Lord (Rochdale South), Keith Barker (Pennines), Sharon Worsley (Middleton) and Mary Kershaw (Heywood).

Rochdale South Representative           Rochdale North Representative                 Pennines Representative

             Debbie Lord                                            Joan Turner                                            Keith Barker

                     Awaiting Photograph

Middleton Representative                       Acting Heywood Representative

        Sharon Worsley                                               Bryn Hackley

Progress of Priority Estates Works

Click on the links below to view the most recent progress reports i.e. Quarter 3 - September 2010

Heywood (907kb pdf)

Middleton (326kb pdf)

Pennines (1.3mb pdf)

Rochdale North (835kb pdf)

Rochdale South (379kb pdf)

Progress Summary:

Below are “before and after” photos of some Priority Estates Work

The above pictures show the new front boundary treatment on Kirklee Road and the ones below show an upgraded courtyard at Century Gardens, Falinge Hill

For further details of the environmental improvement schemes please contact either your local housing office or Paul Dockerty, the Environmental Improvement Programme Co-ordinator on (01706) 516650. email

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