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65
In March your Council decided to serve Closing
Orders in reference to the properties No. 20, Warbeck
Road, and No. 75, St. Stephen's Avenue, Shepherds
Bush.
These premises are houses which have never been
completed or occupied, but were in such a condition
that your Council decided to take action under the
above Act.
Some difficulty was experienced in tracing the
owner of these properties, and Closing Orders were
not served until July.
At the end of the year the question of serving
Demolition Orders was being considered by the Council.
In March I submitted to your Public Health
Committee the following report dealing with the Insanitary
conditions that existed in the houses situated in
Gillards Place :—
3rd March, 1915.
To the Public Health Committee of the Hammersmith
Borough Council.
Gentlemen,
Gillards Place.
This consists of 7 houses built on a site 44 feet by 65 feet,
included in which area is a forecourt 26 feet deep. The
houses are built 4 on the south side and 3 on the north side
facing each other. Each house has a small part of the forecourt,
about 11 feet deep, allotted to it and fenced. Between
these allotments is a path 4 feet wide, imperfectly paved, and
finishing in a dead end. At the west side is an ashpit in a
dirty condition and difficult to keep clean. At the same end
is a tap, off the main, which supplies all the houses except
Nos. 2, 4 and 5.
Gillards Place is bounded on the east side by a building
about 16 feet high, and on the west side by a wall varying
from 9 to 20 feet in height. These structures close in the 7
houses as in a well, preventing movements of air and
excluding much of the light. The yards are, at the rear, in
the main so small that the water closets are practically up
against the back doors. The houses themselves are small,
being two-roomed structures and are in a very bad condition
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