Origins
The city was subject to a widespread regeneration effort following the Birmingham Blitz during World War II. This public demand for modern buildings, combined with Victorian architectural styles falling out of favour, resulted in dozens of fine Victorian buildings like the intricate glass-roofed Birmingham New Street Station, and the old Central Library being destroyed in the 1950s and 1960s by the city planners. These planning decisions were to have a profound effect on the image of Birmingham in subsequent decades, with the mix of concrete ring roads, shopping centres and tower blocks giving Birmingham a 'concrete jungle' tag. Sir Herbert Manzoni was made city engineer of Birmingham and his work included the construction of the Inner Ring Road, Middle Ring Road and the Outer Ring Road, which necessitated the purchase and clearance of vast areas of land. As well as this, he designated large areas of land redevelopment areas and set about clearing large areas of slums. The elevated roadways and the ring roads gave Birmingham the tag; "Britain's motor city". One commentator described Manzoni's vision of Birmingham as a "Godless, concrete urban hell", another a "brutalist, concrete-dominated slave to the motor car"".
In the mid-1980s, Birmingham City Council decided that they needed to change the image Birmingham had to the public, and improve the livability of the city. The first main aim was to target the areas in the city centre that had not been developed following World War II, such as the canals. The council worked closely with Argent, a developer, who redeveloped the area around the canals into a mixed use scheme Brindleyplace, which began in 1994 and was completed in early 2009 with the completion of No 11. This development followed the construction of the National Indoor Arena and the International Convention Centre, which were both completed in 1991.
Another major part of the plan was to redevelop the skyline of the city. The skyline mainly consisted of postwar office buildings and through the creation of the "High Places" document, the council aimed to encourage highrise development in the city once more. Though the document has been met with criticism.
In 2007, a report was commissioned by the Leader of the Council, Councillor Mike Whitby. The result was The Birmingham City Centre Masterplan: The Visioning Study by Professor Michael Parkinson. The Big City Plan was launched in February 2008. Between December 2008 and February 2009 there was an extensive public consultation stage, engaging with citizens in a variety of ways: a website, newspaper supplements, leaflets, posters, a conference, and even an exhibition on a bus that toured inner-city residential districts.
Read more about this topic: Big City Plan
Famous quotes containing the word origins:
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