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From consideration of these tables two points emerge. The
first is the very heavy turnover in the occupation of the houses.
Many sections have, at one time or another, touched the 20 per
cent figure, so that one in five of the occupants of the houses on
that particular section changed their residence in the year. The
other point is that that there is no indication of stability of the
district. If a 10 per cent annual turnover on the entire estate
during its period of growth were due to a very heavy return flow
from those portions recently occupied, although this would represent
a tremendous waste of effort and of money, it would not
possess the serious significance as does the actual state of affairs.
Turning to section No. 1, a section completed by 1927, apart from
the first year 1921-22 when very few houses had been built, the
turnover figure for every year ranges from 7.80 to 13.44. For
sections numbers 2 and 3 the turnover has each year been greater
since the completion of the section than during its period of development.
Due consideration must of course be given to the altered
financial circumstances of many since 1929.
Housing Estates.
The following is extracted from a paper given on the subject
"Problems in Public Health encountered in a New Area." These
problems fall into one of two classes, namely, those which arise
through the rapid growth of the district without preliminary
preparation, and those which might have been avoided.
(I) Those arising through rapid growth without preliminary
preparation. So far as relates to the Dagenham portion of the
estate, for four years development took place in a portion of a
rural district, the town containing a population of 30,000 before
it was severed. This rapid development without preliminary
preparation led to difficulties in connection with :—
(a) Transport.—For years there was available only the
previously existing means of communication up to London, an
there were no facilities for intercommunication.
(b) General sanitation.—The same method is being used
to-day for the disposal of house refuse as was previously in operation,
and the same plant for the disposal of sewage. The water
supply, on occasion, was found to be insufficient in amount, an
it was only early in 1932 that a fresh source of supply was secure
(c) Educational facilities.—In the early days of devlopment
schools were put up very gradually, with a result that for
hundreds of children there was no school accommodation. Some
children were here two years before there was a vacancy for them
and many children who were 12 or so when their families came here
never attended school after leaving London. The basis of 1.5