Flint school pupils celebrate town’s Roman heritage at new development

Pupils of a Flint school have delved deep into local history to come up with a name for a new £2.8 million housing development in the town.

Romans Way was chosen by Form L3 at Ysgol Maeshyfryd who were asked by developers Anwyl Construction and Wales & West Housing to choose a name for a new street on the housing association’s development at Coed Onn Road in the town.

The class won an inter-school competition after coming up with four possible names and appropriately Romans Way was ultimately chosen as it is just a few hundred yards from where Anwyl made an important Roman find five years ago.

Now the pupils have seen the new sign delivered to the development of 23 homes, built in partnership with Flintshire County Council, which will be completed this spring and where the first families have already taken up residence.

Anwyl Construction Commercial Manager Simon Rose said:

“We were delighted with the range of names the school came up with and how hard they worked on their project.

Romans Way is really appropriate because just down the road at Oakenholt we discovered an important Roman site and worked with archaeologists to preserve the finds.

Now we’re finishing off here and as we complete the new homes local people are moving in and creating a community.”

Veronica Breeze, a teacher at Ysgol Maeshyfryd, said:

“It was a really good project and we spent a lesson looking at the history of Flint before picking four possible names.

As well as Romans Way the pupils came up with Roderic Street, Raddington Road and Tir Digonedd, which is Welsh for plentiful land.

Roderic the Great was King of Wales in 870 and divided his land between his three sons with any dispute to be settled here on the banks of the River Dee while Raddington was the earliest name for Flint and is in William the Conqueror’s Domesday Book.

Plentiful Land was because of the lead found at Oakenholt, the coal mining at Coleshill and lime extraction at Bagillt which made the area prosperous.”

The Coed Onn development is the result of a partnership between Anwyl Construction, Wales & West Housing and Flintshire County Council and consists of 14 two-bedroom houses, six three-bedroomed houses and three bungalows, including one with special wheelchair access and other disabled-friendly facilities.

The homes also include ‘green’ features such as rainwater-collecting water butts and compost bins.