In 1937 the Birmingham Medical Officer of Health reported that 'a substantial number of dwellings in King's Norton village unfit for human habitation', with many of the houses affected over a hundred years old. In June 1937 the City Council ordered the making of clearance orders, under section 25 of the Housing Act, 1936. With the clearance of city centre slum housing, there was a pressing need for additional social housing in Birmingham. As part of this programme, the City Council built several new housing estates in Kings Norton, including the Wychall Farm and Pool Farm estates in the 1950s and the Primrose and Hawkesley estates in the 1960s and 1970s. These new estates occupied land that had previously been open farmland, most notably the area known as the Three Estates (Pool Farm, Primrose and Hawkesley), which lies mostly to the east of the Birmingham and Worcester canal and the A441 Redditch Road.