The owner of one of the properties in Yorkdale Drive told us how the houses became self-build. The site originally had flour or grain stores. Mr E. Beckwith of Advanced Homes bought the site. He set up a second company to build homes based on the timber frames manufactured by Advanced Homes. Unfortunately, this was at the time of the property price crash in the late 1980s early 1990s. The plots were advertised as self-build properties which could be 100% built by Mr Beckwith’s companies or you could do almost all the ground works yourself. There was a road network in place and each plot had planning permission. For the self-build any contractors you used had to be approved by Advance Homes and the standards required included those of Selby Planning Building Control plus other measures so that once completed you could apply for the NHBS (the name might have changed) 10 year warranty. A building inspector made regular checks, some announced and others at random. He would check he materials and the construction. The construction took about a year before it was livable in. An architect put the reference markers out and a Linley’s JCB was hired to dig the footings. The planning authority were concerned that the roots from the poplar trees at the back of the property might damage the footings despite us getting a report to say the roots would not be a problem. We then had to dig the footings even deeper, about 6 foot deep I think. We also had to put some steel work in the footings. Once the concrete for the footings had been pored we used a bricklayer and labourer to build the walls up to floor level, then the timber frame could be fitted, which was an anxious time as the tolerances were approximately 1 centimetre. The frame arrived on two articulated lorries and a crane and they erected the frame in one day. Ours was the first in Yorkdale Drive but one being build in Yorkdale Court was ahead of us! The original style of houses changed as they were classed as self-build and people could make changes to the design as long as they didn’t move the property forward of the planned line. The house that backs on to the Meadows, and Mr and Mrs Wray’s property became know as Diana’s House. The house was build by Advanced Home for the Ideal Home Exhibition and Diana Princess of Wales toured the house. Once the show was over it was dismantled and build in Yorkdale Drive – hence the name. The plot and subsequent house numbers were different so chaos reigned when people started to move in so the post was often delivered to us! There are now just two families who were there from the beginning. The village has changed a lot in the 26 years we have lived here, the traffic is much busier, there are a lot more houses, many people commute to work plus the facilities are far less including the loss of the Post Office and Wheatsheaf.