[citation needed] The first tranche of housing in Croxteth was built to rehouse families from the Scotland Road area of the city that was subject to mass demolition during the construction of the second Mersey Tunnel.

The first houses in the Croxteth estate were in fact built in the immediate post war period to house skilled workers from Slough and Rugby who had been brought in to the English Electric and Napier factories (on the East Lancs Road), and families from the dockland inner-city areas who had lost their homes through bombing and slum demolition.

However, in the wake of World War II during the late 1940s and early 1950s, massive residential extensions at Croxteth, alongside similar and indistinguishable development of neighbouring Norris Green, resulted in what together, are now regarded as the largest municipal housing estate in Europe.

The area is serviced by two secondary schools (11–18); Dixons Croxteth Academy (mixed) and St John Bosco Arts College (Catholic Girls).

In 2010, a third school, Croxteth Community Comprehensive (Mixed), closed due to poor academic standards and falling pupils numbers, despite local protests and the school achieving higher academic standards in OFSTED reports and on average higher student grades than De La Salle.

[6] Distance runner Robert Pope, who became the first person to complete the 15,600-mile Forrest Gump run, was born and raised in the area.