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Posted on August 18, 2015 by Andy Thorpe under Uncategorized

030 Observing Progress at the Bull Ring

The connection is tower cranes, in this case a multitude of them in a photo taken in June 2001 during the construction of the new Bull Ring shopping centre in Birmingham. (In common with the previous two posts, this photo is also brought to you by the letter B!)  By the way, yes I was daft enough to stand in the road so I could get the composition right.

Although originated on colour slide, it has occurred to me that we are more used to seeing such record shots of cityscapes in black and white.  Perhaps though it’s photos of the 1960s and 1970s that have up until recently been more popular because they come from an era just before many of the changes that occurred in built-up areas around that time.  Town and city centres have however been changing again, from being car dominated with brutalist concrete buildings to being more pedestrian friendly with such concrete structures being replaced.  Perhaps then there are many colour photos documenting the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s that can show significant differences between now and then.

This would hopefully be the case for central Birmingham (I’ve taken a few photos), which has seen many changes in the last 25 years or so. In fact the signalised junction used to have a horrible pedestrian underpass and the road level was much higher between the buildings.  It probably looked quite futuristic in the 1960s and 1970s, being the epitome of a car orientated city of the future that has thankfully been relinquished in favour of a wider choice of more efficient transport modes and creating a city with a more humane environment.  Similar things have happened on other parts of Birmingham’s inner ring road, which isn’t even a complete “ring” anymore.  Hurrah!

The photo above actually documents a stage on the way to significant changes, ie the process of creating a building with the tower cranes, so it’s appropriate that the traffic signals on the junction are showing an amber signal.  This might be lost in a black and white photo, but convention’s sake, here’s the black and white version below!

030 Observing Progress at the Bull Ring BW

As a postscript to this scene, the building that’s been created is fairly iconic in one sense, due to the Selfridges part of it, and controversial in another because the development has reduced the popularity of retail in other parts of the city.  Next idea please!

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