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Filling Gap Sites

In the late 1950s and 1960s the Town Council continued to identify and buy condemned properties within the original town boundary and these were demolished and replaced with various sizes of house. By 1964 the expense incurred had reached the stage where the Town Council had to secure an overdraft of £29000 towards the cost of sixteen houses at Taylor Drive, Southview Terrace and South Street.

10 & 11 South Street (1959):

7-23 South St, c.1900
In 1957 the Council drew up plans for new two-apartment buildings on feus at 10 & 11 South Street, 24 South Street and 15 & 17 Main Street. The two-storey building at 10 & 11 was given priority to help with decanting of tenants of other properties as work progressed. The contract was awarded to L A Anderson and costs were: Mason – A D Walker, Banff £707.18.1; Carpenter – J Durno £961.13.9; Slater – L A Anderson £151.15.8; Electric – J Fraser £69.10s; Plumber – J G Fraser £211.13.1; Painter – J A Cheyne £80.16.5 – a total of £2183.7.0. The first tenants moved in in 1959 and paid a rent of £26 a year.

6, 8 North Street (1960) and 15, 17 Main Street (1961):

In 1957 the Council bought three uninhabitable old houses at 15 & 17 Main Street. They were replaced by two single-storey houses which were completed in 1961 by L A Anderson.
Main St Looking East From No. 15, c.1950
Meanwhile two houses were completed the previous year at the North Street end of the feu, as Nos. 6 & 8.

7, 8 Taylor Drive (1960) and 127, 129 North Street (1962):

The old houses in North Street west of School Lane had been in poor condition in many years, and 115- 17 had already been replaced by new buildings by Don Contractors in 1950. In 1959 the Council purchased No. 129, which had been run as a lodging house by Mr Kelbie, for £60. He was rehoused in one of the new houses at 15 Main Street and two two-storey houses were built on the feu by L A Anderson, completed in 1962. At the same time the other end of the feu was used for two more houses (now 7 & 8) in what was to become Taylor Drive.

71-77 North Street and 1-4 Moss Road (1962):

The largest gap filling project involved several feus in North Street west of what is now Moss Road. In 1959 Burgh Architect Mr Meldrum drew up plans for two blocks of four houses fronting North Street but after discussions with the Department of Housing four further houses were added in the lane which in 1961 was named Moss Road. The department had noted that “in view of how many new houses are being built in the burgh, four lockup garages should be put in hand immediately on the site available.” Contracts were awarded to: Mason – L A Anderson; Carpenter – A D Walker; Roof tiles – L Gordon; Painter – J G Fraser; Electrical – D MacLennan; Painter – W Fraser & Son – costing a total of £19207.1.8. The first tenants moved in in 1962.

Nurse’s house, 94 Main Street (1964):

In 1961 the Town Council agreed to buy, for £350, a feu at 94-98 Main Street with four unfit properties. It was pointed out that half the block was capable of reconstruction, and John Meldrum produced a plan to provide a good quality 3-apartment house, with the remainder to be dismantled for widening of the adjoining lane, where garages would be built at a future date. L A Anderson began the job in 1962 and completed it in late 1964. An extension was added in 1987 by Duncan Harris.

41-44 South Street (1965):

At the School Lane end of South Street, two old houses had been replaced by what are now Nos. 51 & 52. Between them and the Commercial Hotel were two feus with four old houses which by 1965 had been replaced by four 3-apartment houses built by L A Anderson. At the same time the top end of the feus were used to build what are now 56-59 Southview Terrace.
37-51 South St, c.1900

1-6 Taylor Drive (1965):

In 1960 the Town Council decided that the road leading from opposite Wellfield Terrace to the west was to be named Taylor Drive (after the then Provost, John Taylor), and the two houses already there were numbered 1 and 2.
By 1963 plans were ready to build six new houses at the top end of the feus of 111-121 North Street. These were built by Duncan Harris and occupied in 1965.