19th century In 1846 the Hull Glass Company was set up in Wilmington, on the north side of the street now known as Glass House Row. The company rapidly went out of business, being inactive by 1850. Much of the area was undeveloped; the area was outside, and on the edge of the growth of the town of Hull. At the southern edge of the area a swing bridge road crossing the River Hull, Sculcoates Bridge, was opened in 1875. In 1885 the
Hull and Barnsley Railway opened, with a branch to the new
Alexandra Dock passing on an embankment through the northern extremity of the Wilmington area, crossing Cleveland Street at height; By the late 1880s urban growth in east Hull northwards from
Drypool through
the Groves had reached the edges of Wilmington; a school, Chapman Street school, was established on Chapman Street by the school board in 1888 for 866 children, it was expanded to a capacity of 1,163 students in 1902. it was replaced in 1903 by a brick church, St Saviour, architects Brodrick, Lowther, and Walker. Also established by this time, north adjacent to the Swan Flour Mill were the Hull Varnish works; Wilmington Yard, later Cleveland Oil Refinery; Wilmington works; the Wilmington Oil Mills; and a flour mill, later expanded as Wilmington Flour Mill. Further north on Glass House Row was the Anglo-American mill, In the early 1900s a canister (metal tins) works was established by John Wilson (Shipley); By 1910 urban growth north had reached the Victoria Dock Branch Line, mostly high density terraced and court housing, around Withernsea, Dalton, Cornwall and Chapman streets. Between 1910 and 1912 the railway layout at Wilmington was altered: a new station was constructed west of the original on the Victoria Dock Branch Line, In 1915 the British Extracting Co. (subsidiary of
British Oil and Cake Mills) acquired the site of a former brickyards, and began oil processing operations; a large silo and river in-shipment facility was completed in 1919, to the design of architects
Gelder and Kitchen. The plant was connected to the rail network by a branch line running off the
Hull Docks Branch. In 1940
Gill & Duffus established a cocoa mill, British Cocoa Mills (Hull) Ltd., at Cleveland Street, on the site of the former Wilmington works. Spillers Mill was practically destroyed by the bombing, Wilmington station closed in 1964, the Victoria Dock Branch Line closed 1968. The Wilmington cement works closed in 1969. A caravan site opened in Wilmington in 1976. In the 1990s the former Stoneferry canister works, with other land between the Victoria Dock and Hull and Barnsley railway branches west of Cleveland Street was redeveloped into an industrial estate Stoneferry Park; the area included over of old buildings, of which were kept, and by 2002 a further of new industrial accommodation had been built. In around the same time period a new bus depot for the Hull bus fleet (
Stagecoach in Hull) was constructed to the south, the depot opened 1 September 1996.
21st century In 1999/2000 planning applications were submitted for a waste handling facilities including composting and incinerating facilities at Foster Street, with an incinerator on the site of the former British Extracting Co. works. In 2010 ADM Cocoa closed the cocoa mill, citing overcapacity and a move of confectionery production to eastern Europe. In June 2011 a planning application was submitted by
Spencer Group for a
waste-to-energy plant designed to generate 25.5 MW electrical and 3.4 MW gas energy via
gasification and
anaerobic digestion respectively. The plant was split over two sites, part on the site of the former cocoa and Spillers mills; and the second part to the north, west of Glass House Row. The plant was to use approximately 150,000 tonnes of waste wood, plus 37,000 tonnes of locally sourced commercial and industrial waste. The application was accepted in October 2011 and the project received a £19.9 million grant from the UK government (via the
European Regional Development Fund) which was authorised by
European Union in 2012. In 2014 a joint venture of Spencer group and
MWH Global subsidiary MWH Treatment was selected to build the first stage of the £150 million project. The plant obtained via auction
CFD funding in early 2015, with a £119.89 per MWhr
strike price. In late 2015 Spencer Group announced that funding for the scheme had been arranged, with construction to start early 2016, with the facility expected operational by early 2018. ==See also==