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| - ' ' Orchard Park is a housing estate in North Hull. The estate is bound on the south by North Hull Estate. To the North by the open countryside of Holderness and to the West is Cottingham, to the East of Orchard Park are a number of private residential developments. Orchard Park is a 1960s council estate, and has a range of property types ranging from high rise blocks to terraced housing and low rise flats. Numerous properties have since being bought under the Right to buy scheme. The estate has a shopping area and the houses are in a layout inspired by the Radburn design. The Estate originally had 11 tower blocks, though in 2002 three high-rise blocks (Drake House and Milldane blocks 1 and 3) were demolished, and a further block (Vernon House) was demolished in 2004. The remaining blocks have had a series of reviews which have recommended demolition, with a final decision been made in June 2012 to refurbish 2 of the remaining 7 blocks, the other 5 will be demolished starting with Homethorpe in the summer of 2012 In 2008, Hull City Council had decided a new generation scheme for Orchard Park Estate, it was too costly to maintain all the high rise tower blocks and refurbish them, so the council decided to demolish them and replace them with new, low-rise homes instead. In July 2012, the 22 storey Bridgeman house (Homthorpe) was demolished and 11th August 2013 the 20 storey Ashthorpe and 22 storey Milldane tower blocks were demolished as well. The council decided to refurbish 2 of the flats; Gorthorpe and Kinthorpe but a U-turn from the council decided they would be to costly to refurbish and decided to demolish them. Mechanical demolition started the low rise Kinthorpe and Laxthorpe tower blocks in September 2014. The 20 storey block at Highcourt was scheduled for demolition 2013-14 but there was still tennants in the block, they had been moved out in 2014, then demolition started in 2015 and was completed on 8th March 2015. New council homes have been constructed where the Homethorpe flats were and has started at Ashthorpe and Milldane sites. On 11th May, 2015 there was a break-in and a fire at the Gorthorpe tower block, firefighters were called at around 9pm and extinguished the fire, Humberside police are treating the fire as an arson attack as Gorthorpe was the 5th derelict building in Hull to be set ablaze by vandals, nobody was injured at the time and extra security had been put in place, but the demolition of Gorthorpe had been halted because of the North Hull mobile phone masts on the roof are to be moved, demolition is expected in late 2015. The Estate was featured on the Channel 4 series 'Tower Block of Commons' when Austin Mitchell stayed there. There are several pubs and schools on the Estate.
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