Northfield, West Midlands
| Northfield, Birmingham | |
|---|---|
 View of Bristol Road South (A38) at Northfield looking north towards Selly Oak |
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 Northfield, Birmingham
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| Northfield, Birmingham shown within the West Midlands | |
| Population | 25,707 (2011 Ward) |
| • Density | 48.6 per ha |
| OS grid reference | SP025795 |
| Metropolitan borough | |
| Metropolitan county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | BIRMINGHAM |
| Postcode district | B31 |
| Dialling code | 0121 |
| Police | West Midlands |
| Fire | West Midlands |
| Ambulance | West Midlands |
| EU Parliament | West Midlands |
| UK Parliament | |
Northfield is a residential area on the southern outskirts of metropolitan Birmingham, England, and near the boundary with Worcestershire. It is also a council constituency, managed by its own district committee. The constituency includes the wards of Kings Norton, Longbridge, Weoley Castle and the smaller ward of Northfield that includes West Heath and Turves Green.
Mentioned in the Domesday Book and formerly a small village, then included in north Worcestershire, Northfield only became part of Birmingham in 1919 after it had been rapidly expanded and developed in the period prior to World War I. The northern reaches of Northfield fall within the Bournville model village and the southern housing estates were originally built by Austin Motors for their workforce.
A centre of the Midlands nail making industry during the 19th century and home to both the Kalamazoo paper factory and the Austin motor company’s Longbridge factory in the 20th century, today Northfield is predominantly a residential and dormitory suburb for metropolitan Birmingham. Northfield stands on either side of the main A38, heading south from the centre of Birmingham to Bromsgrove and onwards all the way to Cornwall.
Northfield was occupied or visited in the Stone Age as evidenced by a yellow Chert neolithic scraper discovered in Quarry Lane and a stone axe-head found on Tessal Lane, dated to the New stone age. It is also possible that Northfield was occupied in the Bronze age as large burnt mounds of heat-shattered stones have been identified alongside Northfield's streams evidencing occupation of the area over a lengthy period of time. One of these mounds found near Merritts Brook Lane is 16 metres across. Two further mounds, one on Griffin's Brook near Woodlands Park Road and another at the foot of Bell Hill, were radiocarbon-dated to c1070 BCE and c1120 BCE respectively. The usage evidence is not totally conclusive, but the hot stones are believed to have either provided heating for domestic cooking or Bronze Age saunas.
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