Treherbert is an industrial settlement, dating to the 1850s, with housing built following the sinking of a shaft at Cwmsaerbren by the Bute Merthyr Colliery in 1855. The wide, straight roads and grid pattern follow the Bute Estate's interest in planning and design after the Public Health Act of 1848 and are evident on the Ordnance Survey County Series mapping of 1877 (Glamorgan XVIII 9, 1st edition).

The housing is predominantly linear two-storey terraces, largely single fronted and built from the local pennant sandstone. The settlement would have been mainly residential, with the commercial element, seen today, developing from the the latter part of the 19th century with the conversion of residental terraces.

As the town developed it acquired a school, allotments, and a football ground, open air swimming baths (NPRN: 412834) as well as additional terraces of housing and several chapels including the Hope English Baptist Chapel (NPRN: 13841), English Wesleyan Methodist Chapel (NPRN: 13843), Dumfries Street Chapel (NPRN: 13846), Emanuel English Independent Chapel (NPRN: 13845), Bethany English Chapel (NPRN: 13844) and the Horeb Calvinistic Methodist Chapel (NPRN: 13842).


Source: GGAT/CADW Historic Landscape Characterisation - The Rhondda 013 Treherbert.

L. Osborne, RCAHMW, 2012.