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By Jonathan Taylor
‘Parklands’ was the name of a small estate with a large villa fronting Keymer Road, on the site now occupied by the forecourt of National Tyres and Autocare. Parklands Road was built along the western edge of the estate from which it takes its name. However, when it was first built, Parklands Road was called Bonchurch Road. The name was changed in 1907, after owners and occupiers of the road petitioned Keymer Parish Council. It’s not clear why the road was named after Bonchurch, a village on the Isle of Wight, nor why people objected to the name.
It is sometimes said the road was built to house those constructing the London and Brighton Railway, which opened in 1841. In fact, it appears to have been a speculative investment, and the road was not actually built until the late 1870s or early 1880s. At the time, Parklands was owned by James J G Saunders (1833-1889), a Brighton councillor, builders’ merchant and contractor. It is therefore possible that the road was built by Saunders; if not, it must at least have been built with his involvement. The first tenants were typically tradesmen: builders, painters, plasterers, and carpenters – the sorts of people who would have been Saunders’ customers and subcontractors.
Bonchurch Road and Woodsland Road were the first purely residential roads to be laid out in Hassocks, which until then had comprised little more than Keymer Road and the Station Approaches. Initially, terraced houses were built only on the east side of Bonchurch Road. The houses on the west side of the road were not built until about 1900. In the 1950s, the road, now called Parklands Road, was extended further south (where there had been allotments) and then east to join Windmill Avenue, to complete the road we know today.
Lack of drainage was a major problem on Bonchurch Road. The residents relied on cesspools, which required regular emptying, and frequently overflowed. It was reported to a Local Government Board Inquiry in 1896 that ‘the contents of [the cesspools] had to be carried through the houses [in Bonchurch Road] when emptied. If such an arrangement were continued, sooner or later a serious outbreak of fever might occur …’.
The problem was eventually solved by installing a proper system of sewers in Hassocks. This sewerage scheme was authorised in 1899 and completed in 1901. In the April 2023, Hassocks Life featured the sewer vent pipe on Lodge Lane in a local history article; that pipe would have been part of this scheme. Perhaps Bonchurch Road was renamed Parklands Road to disassociate it from the unsanitary conditions that had existed before the sewer system was installed.
