Monument record MBC47853 - Molefield Estate, an estate of prefabricated houses, Turnfurlong, Aylesbury

An estate of prefabricated houses of World War II date is visible on historic aerial photographs as extant buildings and was mapped as part of the Aylesbury Vale Aerial Investigation and Mapping project (EBC18604). Located at Turnfurlong, Aylesbury, and centred at SP 83313 13209. Molefield Estate, an estate of 65 prefabricated buildings is visible on aerial photographs from 1943, some buildings have two paths leading towards them, suggesting there were two dwellings in the same building. The buildings do not appear to have gardens or access for a vehicle and are spread across the area, not in rows. A photograph from 1947 shows an area affected by flooding with one of the prefabs in the background. Newspaper headlines from the 1950s document protests at living conditions in the estate and the state of the ‘huts’. A memory on a website from somebody who lived there between 1949 and 1956 gives the estate name but no other comment. The estate must have been demolished not long after that date; aerial photographs from 1961 show the construction of the extant housing estate in progress and it has been completed by 1967.(1-8)