Community

1,500 houses, 6,000 people, 85% social housing, 2 primary schools, 15 shops and businesses, 1 Chapel.

Beechwood is one of three large council estates in the area built in the 60’s and 70’s to house people moved out of north Birkenhead. Fuelled by high unemployment, by the 80’s it had become notorious for heroin, violence and gangs. Although no longer as bad as it once was, it still carries the scars of the past with ongoing drug and alcohol addiction, unemployment, educational problems, mental health issues and violence. Alongside this there are a growing number of working families, privately owned homes through the ‘right to buy’ scheme, and pride in both the community’s role in improving the estate, and people’s own personal successes.