Perry Barr is a suburban area in north Birmingham, England. It is also the name of a council constituency, managed by its own

district committee In Birmingham, England, each council constituency is managed by a Constituency Committee, made up of all the councillors for the wards in that constituency. Birmingham's ten Council constituencies were formally created as eleven "districts" on 5 ...

. Birmingham Perry Barr is also a parliamentary constituency; its Member of Parliament is Khalid Mahmood. The constituency includes the smaller Perry Barr

ward Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a pris ...

, and the wards of Handsworth Wood, Lozells and East Handsworth, and Oscott, which each elect three councillors to

Birmingham City Council Birmingham City Council is the local government body responsible for the governance of the City of Birmingham in England, which has been a metropolitan district since 1974. It is the most populated local council area in the United Kingdom ...

Etymology

There were four ancient manors in this area (all part of the parish of Handsworth) called Hamstead, Oscott, Perry, and Little (or Parva) Barr. Perry is the area around the parish church and this name is seen on maps but now seldom used. Over time, through confusion or convenience, the whole district came to be known as Perry Barr. "Perry" comes from the Old English "pirige", meaning "pear tree". The derivation of "Barr" is Old Celtic "barro" meaning "hill top". Barr Beacon, the area's highest hill, is in neighbouring

Great Barr Great Barr is now a large and loosely defined area to the north-west of Birmingham, England. The area was historically in Staffordshire, and the parts now in Birmingham were once known as Perry Barr, which is still the name of an adjacent Bir ...

History

Perry Barr was originally two separate entities, both mentioned in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...

as 'Pirio' and 'Barre'. Pirio is recorded as having an estimated population of 35 and Barre with an estimated population of 25.

William Fitz-Ansculf William Fitz-Ansculf was a Norman-French landowner who succeeded his father, Ansculf de Picquigny. Birth and early life William's date of birth is not known, though it was likely in Picquigny, Picardy, now in the Somme department, France, in th ...

is recorded as being the tenant in chief of both manors, and Drogo as the tenant. It is thought that the two manors may have been combined in the Early Middle Ages. In 1874, Perry Barr established its own institute based on the model of the Birmingham and Midland Institute.. In 1878, Henry Irving became the president of the Perry Barr Institute and addressed members of the institute on 6 March 1878. His speech was reprinted in the 13 March release of ''Theatre'' and also reprinted onto pamphlets by the institute's members and sold for sixpence to fund the construction of a new building for the institute. It was converted into a Carnegie-funded library in September 1897. In early 2007, this library, ultimately known as Birchfield Community Library, was demolished due to its dilapidated condition. Another library in the area is Tower Hill Library. Aston Villa opened their Wellington Road ground in Perry Barr in 1876, playing there until 1897. Perry Barr Urban District was an urban district in Staffordshire from 1894 until 1928, when it was largely incorporated into Birmingham and thus also

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Av ...

(this included an area which is now considered part of

). It then became part of the West Midlands in 1974 when Birmingham became a metropolitan borough in the county. In 1903,

Birmingham Crematorium Birmingham Crematorium is a Protestant crematorium in the Perry Barr district of Birmingham, England, designed by Frank Osborne and opened in 1903. A columbarium was added in 1928. The crematorium is now owned and operated by Dignity plc. O ...

, the City's first, was opened by Sir Henry Thompson, president of the Cremation Society, in Perry Barr at 389 Walsall Road. It has been privately owned, currently by Dignity plc. In the 1920s, Oscar Deutsch opened his first ever

Odeon cinema Odeon, stylised as ODEON, is a cinema brand name operating in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Norway, which along with UCI Cinemas and Nordic Cinema Group is part of the Odeon Cinemas Group subsidiary of AMC Theatres. It uses the famous name ...

here. The original cinema is now a conference venue, having also been a

bingo Bingo or B-I-N-G-O may refer to: Arts and entertainment Gaming * Bingo, a game using a printed card of numbers ** Bingo (British version), a game using a printed card of 15 numbers on three lines; most commonly played in the UK and Ireland ** Bi ...

hall. The 1920s

Perry Barr Stadium Perry Barr Stadium (also known as Perry Barr Greyhound Stadium and previously as Alexander Sports Ground(s)) is a stadium and a Greyhound Board of Great Britain regulated greyhound racing track on Aldridge Road in Perry Barr, Birmingham, Engl ...

on the Aldridge Road hosts greyhound racing and the

Birmingham Brummies Birmingham Brummies are a British speedway team founded in 1928. They were inaugural members of the Southern League in 1929. The team have twice finished runner-up in the highest tier of British speedway, during the 1952 Speedway National Le ...

speedway Speedway may refer to: Racing Race tracks *Edmonton International Speedway, also known as Speedway Park, a former motor raceway in Edmonton, Alberta *Indianapolis Motor Speedway, a motor raceway in Speedway, Indiana Types of races and race cours ...

team. It has a 500-seat capacity, and was refurbished in 2004. It is the former home of the

Birchfield Harriers Birchfield Harriers is an athletics club, founded in 1877. Its home is at Birmingham's Alexander Stadium, England. As well as welcoming recreational runners they cater for all levels of experience up to and including Olympic athletes whether a ...

, whose

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

-styled bas relief badge it still carries.Public Sculpture of Birmingham, George T. Noszlopy,

Liverpool University Press Liverpool University Press (LUP), founded in 1899, is the third oldest university press in England after Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press. As the press of the University of Liverpool, it specialises in modern languages, li ...

, 1998, The Harriers now operate from nearby

Alexander Stadium Alexander Stadium is a track and field athletics stadium in Perry Park, Birmingham, England. It hosted the athletics and opening/closing ceremonies of the 2022 Commonwealth Games. Other events held there include the annual British Grand Prix ...

. Aston Technical College (later renamed North Birmingham Technical College) moved to a new site in Perry Barr in the late 1960s, and was incorporated into the creation of Birmingham Polytechnic (now

Birmingham City University , mottoeng = "Do what you are doing; attend to your business" , established = 1992—gained university status1971—City of Birmingham Polytechnic1843—Birmingham College of Art , type = Public , affiliation = ...

) in 1971. Two of the college's buildings existed as part of the university's City North Campus, scheduled to close in 2018. There is a mall-style shopping centre in the district known as "One Stop" Shopping Centre. This was built in the early 1990s, replacing a previous 1960s-era shopping centre. To facilitate the 1990s construction, a length of the River Tame was diverted and canalised. A Wetherspoons pub, the Arthur Robertson, opened later is named after Arthur Robertson, the Birchfield Harriers' first Olympic gold medallist (1908). A memorial to PC Malcolm Walker, of the

West Midlands Police West Midlands Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. The force covers an area of with 2.93million inhabitants, which includes the cities of Birmingham, Coventry, ...

, is situated outside shops on the city-bound side of Birchfield Road. He died on 4 October 2001, when his motorcycle was struck during a police pursuit. The site of the former Perry Hall is now

Perry Hall Park Perry Hall Park or Perry Hall Country Park, and previously Perry Hall Playing Fields, is a park in Perry Barr, Birmingham, England, at . It was in Staffordshire until 1928.'The City of Birmingham', in A History of the County of Warwick: Volume 7, ...

. Perry Park hosted the Birmingham Carnival in 2005.

Transport

Major roads in the ward and constituency include the

M6 motorway The M6 motorway is the longest motorway in the United Kingdom. It is located entirely within England, running for just over from the Midlands to the border with Scotland. It begins at Junction 19 of the M1 and the western end of the A14 at ...

and the A34. Bus routes operated by the

National Express West Midlands National Express West Midlands (NXWM) is a bus operator in the West Midlands that operates services in Birmingham, Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall, Wolverhampton, and Solihull, as well as limited routes outside of the general area of Birmingham, s ...

Perry Barr bus garage in the area include Nos 11A, 11C, 33, 46, 51, 54, 68A, 68C, 907, 907A, 934, 937, 937A (evenings and Sundays), 952, 997, and 997E (towards

Pheasey Pheasey is a residential area of Walsall Metropolitan Borough in the West Midlands of England, often considered to be part of Great Barr. The area was predominantly developed for housing, as the Pheasey Estate, in the 1930s, but work was not ...

). The A4040 and A34 roads cross at Perry Barr, the former carrying the Birmingham Outer Circle bus routes. In addition the

A453 The A453 road was formerly the main trunk road connecting the English cities of Nottingham and Birmingham. However, the middle section of this mainly single-carriageway road has largely been downgraded to B roads or unclassified roads follo ...

towards Sutton Coldfield begins at Perry Barr. Route X51 runs through Perry Barr, but does not stop in Perry Barr. The nearest stop on the route is Walsall Road,

before running non-stop to Birmingham City Centre. To the south-west of the ward is the Walsall line, part of the old

Grand Junction Railway The Grand Junction Railway (GJR) was an early railway company in the United Kingdom, which existed between 1833 and 1846 when it was amalgamated with other railways to form the London and North Western Railway. The line built by the company w ...

, which has two railway stations within the boundaries of the ward;

Hamstead railway station Hamstead railway station serves the Hamstead, Great Barr and Handsworth Wood areas of Birmingham, England. It is located at the junction of Rocky Lane and Old Walsall Road, Hamstead, at Birmingham's border with the borough of Sandwell. It is s ...

and

Perry Barr railway station Perry Barr Railway Station is a railway station in Perry Barr, Birmingham, England, and is one of the oldest continuously operated railway station sites in the world, having first opened in 1837. The station has been rebuilt several times, inc ...

. The latter, opened in 1837, is one of the oldest stations in the country to remain on its original site. The

Tame Valley Canal The Tame Valley Canal is a relatively late (1844) canal in the West Midlands of England. It forms part of the Birmingham Canal Navigations. It takes its name from the roughly-parallel River Tame. Geography The canal runs from Tame Valley Junc ...

bisects the ward, with boats from

Salford Junction Salford Junction () is the Junction (canal), canal junction of the Grand Union Canal, Grand Union and Tame Valley Canals with the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal. It is in the north of the administrative city of Birmingham, England and historical ...

, under Gravelly Hill Interchange climbing the 13-flight Perry Barr

Locks Lock(s) may refer to: Common meanings *Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance *Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal Arts and entertainment * ''Lock ...

towards Hamstead and on to Rushall Junction. There is a feeder reservoir, Perry Reservoir, in Perry Park.''Nicholson waterways Guide 2 – Severn, Avon and Birmingham'', Collins, 2006 The River Tame passes through the area and is crossed by several bridges, including Perry Bridge, a scheduled ancient monument of 1711, on the line of the Roman Ryknild Street and its 1932 Art Deco replacement carrying the Aldridge Road. The old bridge appears on the badge of nearby Handsworth Grammar School. A stream, the

Holbrook Holbrook may refer to: Places England *Holbrook, Derbyshire, a village * Holbrook, Somerset, a hamlet in Charlton Musgrove * Holbrook, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, a former mining village in Mosborough ward, now known as Halfway *Holbrook, Suffolk, ...

, originating on the slopes of Barr Beacon, flows into the river just upstream from the bridge. The area around the bridge is known as

Holford Holford is a village and civil parish in West Somerset within the Quantock Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It is located about west of Bridgwater and east of Williton, with a population of 392. The village is on the Quantock Greenway ...

Sport

Aston Manor Cricket Club are situated in Perry Barr, as is the international athletics stadium

. These are located on Church Road just by Perry Park. The Hub on Holford Drive is home to Continental Star F.C., as well as Continental Star Cricket, tennis clubs, and Aston Amateur Boxing Club. Perry Barr Greyhound Stadium on the Aldridge Road plays host to two sports: greyhound racing, which is primarily run on Saturday nights with daytime meetings during the week, and

, the team racing there being the

, who run on a Wednesday night schedule from April to October. The Birmingham Brummies currently ride in the

SGB Championship The Speedway Great Britain (SGB) Championship is the second division of speedway league competition in the United Kingdom, governed by the Speedway Control Bureau (SCB), in conjunction with the British Speedway Promoters' Association (BSPA). It ...

which is the second tier of British speedway.

Ward

The Perry Barr ward is part of the Birmingham, Perry Barr parliamentary constituency. Following boundary changes in 2004, the eastern edge of the ward follows the

from

Spaghetti Junction Spaghetti junction is a nickname sometimes given to a complex or massively intertwined road traffic interchange that is said to resemble a plate of spaghetti. Such interchanges may incorporate a variety of interchange design elements in ord ...

to junction 7 at

, including parts of the communities of Witton, Aston, Perry Barr and

. Since 2004, the three councillors representing Perry Barr on

have been Ray Hassall, Karen Hamilton and Jon Hunt, all of them Liberal Democrats. Hassall was elected in 1990, Hunt in 2003 and Hamilton in 2004. Hamilton became the first black councillor elected for the ward. In a 2017 by-election, Morriam Jan, elected as a Liberal Democrat, became the first councillor of

South Asia South Asia is the southern subregion of Asia, which is defined in both geographical Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth descr ...

n origin elected for the ward. Prior to 1990, the ward had a strong tendency towards the Conservative Party. No single party held all the seats in the ward between 1990 and 2004. The Liberal Democrats took a clean sweep at the 2004 Council Elections in which all seats were contested, but only after three recounts. In 2006, Hamilton increased her personal majority from 31 to more than 1,500, and the party went on to win every election in the ward until boundary changes in 2018. The ward had Labour representation for a period, from 1995 till 2004 following the election of Mike Leddy (1995–2003), along with the defection of Ron Whitehouse from the Liberal Democrats to the Labour Party (2000–2004). For the 2018 and any subsequent elections the ward was reduced in size to two councillors and parts of the former Aston ward, included in 2004, were returned to a new Aston ward. The new Perry Barr ward includes Witton Cemetery and the Moor Lane Sports Ground.

Election winners

*1986 – Conservative *1987 – Conservative *1988 – Conservative *1990 – Liberal Democrat *1991 – Liberal Democrat *1992 – Conservative *1994 – Liberal Democrat *1995 – Labour *1996 – Liberal Democrat *1998 – Liberal Democrat *1999 – Labour *2000 – Liberal Democrat (defected to Labour within 12 months) *2002 – Liberal Democrat *2003 – Liberal Democrat *2004 – 3 x Liberal Democrat (following boundary changes) *2006 – Liberal Democrat - Karen Hamilton *2007 – Liberal Democrat - Jon Hunt *2008 – Liberal Democrat - Ray Hassall *2010 – Liberal Democrat - Karen Hamilton *2011 – Liberal Democrat - Jon Hunt *2012 – Liberal Democrat - Ray Hassall *2014 – Liberal Democrat - Karen Trench (previously Hamilton) *2015 – Liberal Democrat - Jon Hunt *2016 - Liberal Democrat - Ray Hassall (deceased March 2017) *2017 (by-election) – Liberal Democrat - Morriam Jan *2018 - 2 x Liberal Democrat (following boundary changes) - Jon Hunt & Morriam Jan

Demographics and notable residents

The 2001 Population Census recorded that 22,704 people were living in Perry Barr. 28.2% (6,410) of the ward's population was represented by

ethnic minorities The term 'minority group' has different usages depending on the context. According to its common usage, a minority group can simply be understood in terms of demographic sizes within a population: i.e. a group in society with the least number o ...

, compared with 29.6% for Birmingham in general. British musician Steve Winwood was a

choirboy A choirboy is a boy member of a choir, also known as a treble. As a derisive slang term, it refers to a do-gooder or someone who is morally upright, in the same sense that "Boy Scout" (also derisively) refers to someone who is considered honora ...

at St John's Church of England

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in community activities, ...

in Perry Barr.

References

External links

Birmingham City Council: Perry Barr Constituency

Birmingham City Council: Perry Barr Ward

Perry Barr Community Network

Birchfield Library
* {{Wards of Birmingham Areas of Birmingham, West Midlands Wards of Birmingham, West Midlands