Kirkholt is a housing estate on the outskirts of Rochdale, England. Built in 1945 by German prisoners of war, Kirkholt currently comprises 4,082 homes housing 9,000 residents making it one of Britain's larger estates. Kirkholt comprises a mixture of houses and cottage flats built along narrow, winding roads, interconnected by numerous badly-lit alleys or 'ginnels'.
In 1985, the Kirkholt Burgalary Prevention Project was started as a response to the fact that, over the previous 12 months, 25% of the homes on Kirkholt had been burgled. One of the projects main findings was that 49% of burglaries involved theft from coin operated pre-payment gas and electric meters, with 27% of burglaries involving only meter theft. As a result of this, coin operated metre usage was phased out on Kirkholt.
Kirkholt is currently managed by Rochdale Boroughwide Housing, an Arms Length Management Organisation working on behalf of Rochdale Council.
Kirkholt has recently been made the subject of a long term improvement plan which involves demolition of much of the existing council stock to be replaced with private housing.
The BBC school drama 'Waterloo Road' was filmed in Kirkholt from 2005 to 2011.