Description

Covering 800ha, the regeneration of Birmingham city centre is an immense project. Set in the context of the 1990 City Centre Urban Design Strategy, the overall aim of the different elements of this transformation has been to create a 'barrier free' city, where people can easily see and get to where they want to go and which is accessible to those with prams or wheelchairs.

Within this context a new and distinctive centre and a series of new public squares including Victoria Square (see separate case study), Chamberlain Square and Centenary Square have been created, with streets reclaimed for pedestrians, subways infilled, roadways recreated or pushed underground and traffic re-organised.

Interventions have been designed to encourage pedestrian movement in the city's streets and open spaces, and to create new routes over the 'concrete collar', through buildings, through new and existing open spaces, along and over the city's canals, while restricting vehicular access.

These measures have been guided by a raft of integrated principles including landmarks as route markers, easy physical linkages, (encouraging street level activity in buildings), visual continuity through co-ordinated paving materials, street furniture and public art, access to canals and activity at their edges, specially commissioned street lighting, improvement of facades along key streets and softening the city and enhancing open space with trees and planting as well as creating green linkages on routes.