Lytham St.Annes Coat of Arms

 
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Lytham St.Annes, Lancashire, England
 

 

 

Blackpool Herald, 23rd August 1941
 

PROTECTION FOR 85,300

BLACKPOOL IS RACING TO COMPLETE ITS PLANS TO PROVIDE AIR-RAID SHELTERS FOR 85,300 PEOPLE BEFORE THE DARK DAYS OF AUTUMN AND WINTER.

"Every shelter in the schedule should be built within the next eight or 10 weeks," reported Mr. James Drake, B.Sc., the Borough Engineer and Surveyor, under whose efficient and enterprising direction the scheme has been designed and operated, to a "Gazette & Herald" reporter yesterday.

The total cost to the town of the 1.768 shelters will be about £300,000. The remarkable progress of these ambitious plans to protect the town's increased population from air raids deserves a chapter to itself in the history of Blackpool's municipal administration.

RAPID PROGRESS

"Last November," recalled Mr.Drake, "the total accommodation in air-raid shelters, exclusive of private shelters, was 12.000. Ever since, week after week, shelters have been built until today there is already accommodation for over 70.000 people.


"There was a time during a peak period of this non-stop contract, when accommodation was being increased at the rate of 3.000 a week at a cost, each week of about £12,000. Now the end is near."

Inside two months the last of the shelters will have been completed. Even then "Halt" will not be called immediately, for afterwards a number of the shelters built last November are to be strengthened, and will be encased in new reinforced concrete.

SCHOOLS, TOO

The accommodation in the various types of shelter in the completed scheme -is: 14,000 in public shelters 50,000 in communal surface, shelters, 9,800 in basement shelters, 16,500 in school shelters. All the public and schools shelters are built and already there is accommodation for 37,000 in surface shelters and 3.600 in basement shelters.

At the present time, with the last of the shelters being erected, protection for an additional 1,700 is being built every week. It represents one of the Corporation's major achievements.