St Patrick's Road

Just curious Pat, how did you feel about the "ghost houses" as I used to call them at the end of St Patrick's Road? For the uninitiated these were very substantial houses which were gutted during the war but left standing for decades afterwards for no apparent reason.

Hi Dutchman, not quite sure which end of the road you mean. At Quinton rd end there were about four houses then the spaces where houses had been bombed. Also several more gaps all along the road where various houses also came down.The other side had the large spare ground as we used to call it by the what is now police station. And the opposite end to that had missing houses too. As I was there from 1953 to 1979 it was a changing picture when the ring road started to be built. I would off loved to see pictures of it before the war but unfortunately my parents hadn't got any.

Hi Pat I mean the row of semis where the roof timbers were left exposed but were otherwise intact. I think it was at the station end? There was a planning application to rebuild them but the council as usual blocked it. There's a picture of the row as I remember it one of the books but I can't remember which book it is. This is allegedly a pre-war picture of a completely different part of St Patrick's Road: Pictures of Coventry

Hi Dutchman, Sorry I cant recall them. That end of the road had the long wall with overgrown land behind it. I can remember there were remains of a shed and outhouse there. There were a few houses too but were lived in. Thanks for the photo,that looks like the wall I mean looking down to the Park Road entrance

No allegedly about it, D! It's taken right at the Warwick Road end of St Patricks Road The building on the right of the photo faced out onto Eaton Road and was our doctors' surgery (Archer-Hall, Gould, etc), with an entrance to the reception and waiting room from St Patricks Road - after consultation, the exit was by the main front door of the building into Eaton Road It's just above the "O" in "OF" in this photo. Just beyond the large houses behind the bus would be the turning into Manor Road - from memory they were a pair of large semi-detached houses, I used to delivery papers to one of them.

In this image, there looked to have been some seriously nice/impressive houses in the Park Road/St Patricks Road area.

I think the large houses were in Eaton Road, in the approach to the station and of course there is still one pair of these standing. This area of the city was developed towards the end of the nineteenth century when it was released from Cheylesmore Park and much of it was leasehold, which may have been a factor in why postwar restoration was slow. it was interesting to see the report in the Telegraph about the Vatican investments in the city using the name of British Grolux. They ultimately acquired the freehold interest in this chunk of the Cheylesmore Estate and I believe they bought it from Coventry Newspapers [but the Telegraph did not report that bit!].

Drove on the Ring Road this morning - there's some monstrous looking blocks going up on St Patricks Road at the moment next to the old remaining houses.

Juxtapositioning seems to be the only thing the Council knows or thinks!!

You missed this one then, Neil (Coventry out and about)

Friars Road

The view east post-war but before they removed all of the properties on the south side for the Ring Road.

We don't have a dedicated Eaton Road or Warwick Road thread, so adding here as that's St Patricks's going off ahead. Thanks to CliffB.

The address was actually No.1 Manor Road but it was right at the junction with St Patrick's Road and we don't have a dedicated Manor Road thread so adding here. This was Penvorn - the house where Philip Larkin grew up in (he was born in Poultney Road) from when he was about 5 years old. Strangely it's gone on my 1950 map despite many of the other large properties in the area still standing post-war and most comments on the web saying it was cleared for the Ring Road so this was not 100% accurate. Many a prestigious address in the area at the time - sad they have virtually all gone now.