Birmingham New Street

[mikeyp102]

More places for people to buy stuff, is that really going to put Birmingham back on the map? A new train station that seriously addresses platforms, capacity and enables more services may be a good start, not a chuffing shopping centre. 

From a tourism view, I'd say more shops would go a long way towards putting Birmingham back on the map. People go to Leeds/Liverpool/Manchester specifically for shopping, they make a weekend of it. Why shouldn't Birmingham get that as well?

[bickster]

Do they hell come to Liverpool to go shopping, might be what the women tell their menfolk, but they come here to get pissed basically. Nightlife is why people come to Liverpool. There are no special shops here that aren't in any reasonably large town or city. People do not come here to shop. The reason Liverpool has become popular is the sheer amount of events that the city puts on over the summer months, its rare that a week goes by from April to September that there isn't a huge event on and the ability to drink very easily until 6am.

You want tourists, thats what you do, not build a shopping centre. Put events on and relax licensing laws

[MakemineVanilla]

Do they hell come to Liverpool to go shopping, might be what the women tell their menfolk, but they come here to get pissed basically. Nightlife is why people come to Liverpool. There are no special shops here that aren't in any reasonably large town or city. People do not come here to shop. The reason Liverpool has become popular is the sheer amount of events that the city puts on over the summer months, its rare that a week goes by from April to September that there isn't a huge event on and the ability to drink very easily until 6am.

You want tourists, thats what you do, not build a shopping centre. Put events on and relax licensing laws

Sounds perfectly inclusive too. 

[villa4europe]

You want tourists, thats what you do, not build a shopping centre. Put events on and relax licensing laws

the council would argue that the 80+ coaches a day that come in to brum for the german market for the next 6 weeks says otherwise...

brum has made a concerted effort to make itself a shopping destination, first the bullring now the station, agree with the comments about liverpool and events but brum has been dying a death on that front for a long time, a lot of tours, events etc will skip brum, broad street is on its ass, with the huge development of the various unis in the city id expect the nightlife to develop again (redevelopment of digbeth maybe?) theres about 5/6 nights out in the different bits of brum but not really one in dale end where they've built all the new accommodation stuff

[Dr_Pangloss]

Is shopping really the answer though? High streets and malls have been taking a huge hit due to online shopping, yes, the Bullring is probably the most visited shopping centre in the UK (outside of shopping centres in London like Westfield), but at the margin, how much is a John Lewis and a couple of other shops in a train station going to add? And what about the long term where surely the need to physically show up to shop is going to be even 'lower'. 

 

It's also kind of sad that 'Birmingham bouncing back' merely implies the creation of more low paid and low skilled jobs, we used to actually make stuff here.

Edited November 2, 2015 by Dr_Pangloss

[AndyM3000]

From what I have seen the shops all seem like classier places, mostly for women. Plus a lot of food places.

 

All this has done has made New Street full of people walking around without a care in the world. People can't seem to figure out how to work the ticket barriers either. 

 

In short, get out the **** way I have a train to catch.

[Stevo985]

I'm still baffled by the amount of people who have never seen ticket barriers before and can't seem to comprehend how they work.

[chrissmith921]

Cardiff Central > that thing.

No fancy ass stores, no mucking about - just platforms and trains.

Plus a platform 0, so screw all you guys

 

I take if you've not seen the plans for the 'new' Cardiff Central then Chris?  They are putting a giant greenhouse on top of the old frontage and the BBC are moving in next door.  Nobody can confirm or deny whether there will be a Yo! Sushi in the new station.  

not seen - but hey that thing will last about 3-4 weeks in that part of town before someone puts something through the roof

since they redeveloped the bay, the centre of Cardiff has gone to sh1t.

[chrissmith921]

More places for people to buy stuff, is that really going to put Birmingham back on the map? A new train station that seriously addresses platforms, capacity and enables more services may be a good start, not a chuffing shopping centre. 

From a tourism view, I'd say more shops would go a long way towards putting Birmingham back on the map. People go to Leeds/Liverpool/Manchester specifically for shopping, they make a weekend of it. Why shouldn't Birmingham get that as well?

My misses has never said "I want to go to Birmingham to go shopping" - I wish she would, I'd happily leave her there for a few hours while I take in a 0-2 home defeat to some London club seeing us shoot twice for the privilege and one of them being Gustede and therefore shouldn't register as a shot but a misplaced pass...

 

[bickster]

You want tourists, thats what you do, not build a shopping centre. Put events on and relax licensing laws

 

the council would argue that the 80+ coaches a day that come in to brum for the german market for the next 6 weeks says otherwise...

brum has made a concerted effort to make itself a shopping destination, first the bullring now the station, agree with the comments about liverpool and events but brum has been dying a death on that front for a long time, a lot of tours, events etc will skip brum, broad street is on its ass, with the huge development of the various unis in the city id expect the nightlife to develop again (redevelopment of digbeth maybe?) theres about 5/6 nights out in the different bits of brum but not really one in dale end where they've built all the new accommodation stuff

Did you actually read what you wrote in response to my post? I said put on events and relax licensing laws to which you countered that Birmingham has 80 coaches a day that come to shop at the German Market… which is an event with relaxed licensing laws (for Brum anyway). People really come to the German Market to get pissed lets be honest...

[PongRiddims]

You want tourists, thats what you do, not build a shopping centre. Put events on and relax licensing laws

 

the council would argue that the 80+ coaches a day that come in to brum for the german market for the next 6 weeks says otherwise...

brum has made a concerted effort to make itself a shopping destination, first the bullring now the station, agree with the comments about liverpool and events but brum has been dying a death on that front for a long time, a lot of tours, events etc will skip brum, broad street is on its ass, with the huge development of the various unis in the city id expect the nightlife to develop again (redevelopment of digbeth maybe?) theres about 5/6 nights out in the different bits of brum but not really one in dale end where they've built all the new accommodation stuff

Did you actually read what you wrote in response to my post? I said put on events and relax licensing laws to which you countered that Birmingham has 80 coaches a day that come to shop at the German Market… which is an event with relaxed licensing laws (for Brum anyway). People really come to the German Market to get pissed lets be honest...

Can confirm, only attend for beer and sausage #NoHomo

[Xela]

 

I've glad MMV wasn't chief planner at Birmingham City Council otherwise there would have been a giant food bank built above New St Station! 

Shopping Centres have always been partly aspirational though haven't they? I'm guessing if people can't afford to shop at Grand Central now then they wouldn't have been able to shop at the Pallasades before. Grand Central is a lot better looking than the Pallasades was and I guess will bring more people to the city which is a good thing. 

 

What a fantastic idea - I never thought of that.

They have plenty of empty units and they could easily donate one for a food bank and they could have a machine for donating guilt tax.

 

Must remember next time I'm painting my house to ignore the urge and just put all the money I would have spent into a homeless man's hat.

Edit: **** the quoting on this site!

Next time you think of booking a holiday with your missus... don't. Draw the money out, drive to Alum Rock and throw it out the window.

[Xela]

You want tourists, thats what you do, not build a shopping centre. Put events on and relax licensing laws

 

the council would argue that the 80+ coaches a day that come in to brum for the german market for the next 6 weeks says otherwise...

brum has made a concerted effort to make itself a shopping destination, first the bullring now the station, agree with the comments about liverpool and events but brum has been dying a death on that front for a long time, a lot of tours, events etc will skip brum, broad street is on its ass, with the huge development of the various unis in the city id expect the nightlife to develop again (redevelopment of digbeth maybe?) theres about 5/6 nights out in the different bits of brum but not really one in dale end where they've built all the new accommodation stuff

I think the nightlife in Brum is varied and wide. You've got Broad Street, which has a few new places on it (it did go through a lull, granted), Brindleyplace, the Mailbox, Arcadian, the Jewellery Quarter and Digbeth plus the continued improvement of the Financial District. There are new restaurants and bars opening up weekly. What makes Liverpool or Manchester such a better night out? There is everything you could want in Brum including 5 Michelin starred restaurants (2 in the City and 3 within a couple of miles), compared to 0 in Manchester

I think Carl Chinn said it, that Manchester is much better than Birmingham for bigging itself up. Brummies tend to downplay their city and not shout about it. That's what gives the perception that other cities have the edge, which I don't think is true

 

Edited November 2, 2015 by Xela

[bickster]

Those places are spread out over a huge area. In Liverpool theres only three areas and its fairly easy to walk between the three too (or jump an inexpensive cab by UK standards).

Birmingham has nowhere near the events Liverpool puts on, some of them very newsworthy and unique. Hell my mate Seamus is involved in organising much better events in Derry than Birmingham has. Now Liverpool also has the new Exhibition / Conference Centre opened a few months back, its set to take tourism to yet another level. I think Liverpool Council get a whole lot of things very wrong but you can't fault them for the effort they go to to organise and encourage others to organise events and attractions to bring people into the city. Oh and then there's that band I hate...

[blandy]

Queen

[bickster]

Queen

No the other one

[blandy]

Big Country

[MakemineVanilla]

 

I've glad MMV wasn't chief planner at Birmingham City Council otherwise there would have been a giant food bank built above New St Station! 

Shopping Centres have always been partly aspirational though haven't they? I'm guessing if people can't afford to shop at Grand Central now then they wouldn't have been able to shop at the Pallasades before. Grand Central is a lot better looking than the Pallasades was and I guess will bring more people to the city which is a good thing. 

 

What a fantastic idea - I never thought of that.

They have plenty of empty units and they could easily donate one for a food bank and they could have a machine for donating guilt tax.

 

Must remember next time I'm painting my house to ignore the urge and just put all the money I would have spent into a homeless man's hat.

Edit: **** the quoting on this site!

Next time you think of booking a holiday with your missus... don't. Draw the money out, drive to Alum Rock and throw it out the window.

A lot of reasonable people would say that when you go out and make a purchase with money you've already paid tax on, and the cost of that purchase includes another 20% mark-up in tax you're handing to the government, then whether the government chooses to spend that tax on the poor or on Trident is their moral responsibility and you can't be held accountable for that choice, or pay out more to make their choice look better.

And they would be right.

 

[Wainy316]

Manchester and Liverpool get more tourism due to their worldwide football brands.

Garde out!

[bickster]

Manchester and Liverpool get more tourism due to their worldwide football brands.

 

Garde out!

Nah, a lot of the football tourists are day-trippers, lots of the Irish even fly in and out the same day, the Scandis arrive on the day and are on the first flight back in the morning. Not all but the Season Ticket holders for sure. They buy some beers but they don't really contribute that much to the local economy. The B****** fans do and so do the stag and hen parties, the whole weekend for them and the events visitors. They do a bit of shopping but its not their main focus. The only people I've ever encountered come for the shopping are the Dubliners who come to empty Primarni and they still only do that in between being on the lash.