How does Birmingham get its backbone back?

Alan Chatham, Chair of Retail Birmingham looks at crucial  role of New Street in the future development of Birmingham’s retail area

Great cities have great streets. Streets that help to orientate visitors; that provide a clear route to explore and move people from one side of a city to the other.

Great streets create a spine for many of the world’s most successful retail locations. New York’s Fifth Avenue, Las Ramblas in Barcelona, Oxford Street in London – these routes are renowned destinations in their own right, but they also provide a vital function for visitors and shoppers looking to find their way.

New Street in Birmingham should naturally take the role of our city’s spine. With great civic buildings to the west – the beautifully restored Town Hall and the impressive Council House, and Birmingham’s world renowned Bullring to the East, New Street should be a familiar and inviting route to visitors and a great exemplar of how a key anchor street in a world class city should look and feel. But it’s clear that for a wide variety of reasons, New Street isn’t providing this function.Having spoken to lots of people in the city I know I’m not alone in thinking  that Birmingham has lost its spine.

In September 2009 Retail Birmingham launched an ambitious project to set the direction for  the future development of Birmingham’s central retail area.

The six month design project, led by Make Architects, will provide an overarching design ambition for Birmingham city centre and identify key character areas for  development.The study will come up with a series of proposals for  improving the identity and connectivity of Birmingham’s retail district to create a spectacular shopping environment befitting of a great international city.

New Street is one of the major talking points that has emerged from our first stage of consultation. In fact, one of our consultees asked the question, “With a new New Street Station underway, can Birmingham afford to have an old New Street?”

What can Retail Birmingham, our partners and retailers do to ensure that Birmingham’s retail area gets its backbone back? And is tackling New Street enough? Which other critical routes do we need to address?

The debate continues…