I must say there seem to be some emerging common issues – Lighting, retention and reuse of historic buildings and Cash Points seem to be on most people’s list!
This morning myself and many other local types went along to the Digbeth Corridor Study Stakeholder Consultation meeting at The Bond, organised by Birmingham City Council’s City Centre Development Team. The Big City Plan’s Philip Singleton kicked off the proceedings, then we all boarded the Green Bus, on which a team from Atkins took us on a tour of Digbeth’s key features. Once we’d been gotten thinking we returned to The Bond, where we split into brainstorm groups covering Movement, Streets, Events, Development, Leisure & Environment, Creativity & Services.
Whilst there Atkins asked us to complete a Digbeth Consultation Questionnaire to help them with their study, and asked us to pass it onto anyone we thought might like to submit their ideas. Unfortunately it is not available online, so I’ve created a Google Form so you can complete it online if you like. I’ll forward the summary spreadsheet to Atkins, who I spoke to during the meeting and are aware of what I’m doing. You can comment on the dedicated Digbeth Consultation Questionnaire page I’ve created, so you can discuss your feelings about the questionnaire if you want to. Questionnaires must be submitted by mid-January (I’ll double check the exact date with Atkins, and be sure to close the form then).
Digbeth Area Noise and Nuisance Study – the results | Rich Batsford – Rich talks about Advantage West Midlands’ presentation of Atkins’ Digbeth Noise & Nuisance study on Thursday. I only caught the tail-end of the presentation but must admit I found the short time I was there rather frustrating – it didn’t tell us anything new and just seemed to be validating that the issue exists, which was very old news for many of us. Neither did it offer any advice on how these issues can be resolved.
They made some somewhat vague but potentially useful suggestions as to how things might move forward in the future, but little or no strategy for how to resolve the disputes that currently exist such as the Rainbow and Spotted Dog versus someone complaining in the Abacus development.
I was left with the overriding conviction that the Abacus should never have been built…but we are stuck with the fact that it is there and somehow we have to deal with it. Otherwise it looks dangerously as tho the simplest “out” for the Council is going to be to dampen the noise in the area which might ultimately spell disaster for the Rainbow and the Spotted Dog.
Following a number of high-profile noise-related disputes, W. S. Atkins Ltd were asked to investigate and report on local noise activities to better understand these issues and their economic impact on the local economy.
Having consulted with developers, businesses and residents across the area, the study has now been completed, and the report will be passed over to Birmingham City Council, who will then consider how its recommendations that will help maintain the area’s vibrant economy.
Graham Edwards, chief Executive of East Birmingham North Solihull Regeneration Zone also has some exciting comments:
Digbeth has an important role to play in the future development of Birmingham’s creative industries. This is why we, along with Advantage West Midlands, have made it a priority for support, working with developers to offer new space for businesses. It is exactly this kind of state-of-the-art facility we are trying to encourage through our Strategic Investment Plan, which focuses on creating growth through new enterprise.
It’ll be interesting to see how this ‘priority support’ takes shape, I have high hopes.
How do vegetarians get fat? – By eating like pigs, but not pigs, in the Friends of the Earth Warehouse Cafe on Allison Street, according to Paul Fulford in the Evening Mail.
Digbeth Olympics Ridiculous River Rea Raft Race – John Mostyn, Adam Crossley and some unconvincing-sounding Welsh guy travel down the River Rea in rubber dingies and manage to emerge with all their skin intact.
Gigbeth competition – This competition for free weekend tickets is such a fantastic idea: ‘Gigbeth is looking for entrants to create their own version of The Sugarhill Gang classic ‘Rappers Delight’ and post them on a specially created You Tube page. Entrants are invited to come up with the best and most original alternative music video to the ground breaking hit, or to produce their very own recorded performance of the song.’ If like me, you just fancy giggling at the entries rather than making one, all entries will be posted on Gigbeth’s YouTube.
Pub Crawl – The Final Leg – Bull Ring and Digbeth – A guy and his camera in the Bull Ring and ‘Digbeth, dusty, dirty, noisy Digbeth’. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, his camera died as soon soon as he hit The Dubliner. This may be a good time to tell you that me and Antonio Gould are planning to do a repeat of last year’s Digbeth pub crawl for our birthdays on Saturday 10th January 2009. We plan to make it bigger, better and bloggier, photographing and twittering our locations and drunkeness levels. All are welcome, especially if you’re wearing a flat cap – stick it in your diaries!
