Prepare for Pride
Plus: Budding female business owners get a boost
Dear Patchers — Welcome to your Tuesday briefing.
Today we’re delivering you a run-through of the latest development news in the West Midlands. With the Smithfield regeneration plans hitting another hurdle and a kick off over student housing in Coventry, there is, however, some good news — especially for those looking for a property bargain in the Black Country.
Elsewhere, we share links to information on Pride — upcoming this weekend — as well as a city media festival aiming to shine a light on Benjamin Zephaniah’s legacy.
There are now almost 16,000 of us in the Dispatch community. It’s excellent to have so many of you on this start-up media journey with us. If you want access to all of our content and the archives, please do consider taking out a subscription.
Until next time. Dan.
Brum in Brief
🌲Regen rebound: The almost £2bn Smithfield regeneration project has been deferred once more with concerns over proposals for green and open spaces. With the plans expected to deliver 3000 homes, Councillor Gareth Moore raised concerns about how developer Lendlease's proposals were “not compliant” with overall plans for the city’s future, which include a large-capacity events space for the area. This isn’t the first stumbling block in the Smithfield plans. In 2022, Historic England said it couldn’t support plans which harmed the city’s historic foundations. Full story.
🏗️Student flats furore: A controversial decision to allow city centre land to be turned into student flats has ignited divisions in Coventry. The city council greenlit Westwood Business Park to be turned into a 544-bed building — much to the chagrin of protestors who wanted to stop the development. The council has said it needs to go ahead to improve the coffers. However, one recent report suggests there is too much student accommodation in the city, with one student building only two-thirds full and having to apply to rent out to those not studying. Full story.
👩Calling all female entrepreneurs: Birmingham is one of five cities outside of London chosen to help kickstart budding female business owners. The Lifted Project wants to increase the number of female-founded high-growth enterprises by 50% within three years and has announced that Birmingham will have its own regional growth board to help entrepreneurs understand how to scale their ideas. The Brum board will be chaired by Tara Attfield-Tomes, who said the city has “a well-connected ecosystem” for early career business people, but “we’re still missing the coordination and influence needed to really create change”. More here.
🏳️🌈Out and proud: This year’s Pride parade takes place on Saturday, with over 75,000 expected to take part in the free event. Starting at Centenary Square at 11am, the march will make its way to the LGBTQ+ village before people head to the main festival activities. Full information here.
🎧Listen up: Benjamin Zephaniah is to be remembered at UniPodFest, a festival which celebrates podcasters from across the region. George the Poet and academic Dr Martin Glynn will pay tribute to the late poet, activist and ‘proud Brummie’. Festival director Nina Robinson said: “Benjamin Zephaniah has always been inspiring, and he embodies so much of what is wonderful about Birmingham and the talented people that live here.” Find out more here.
Re.Student Flats Furore: it has been noticed in certain areas near my home, blocks of certain types of accommodation are being granted planning permission and being erected, but for whatever reason are not being lived in. One wonders of these blocks have got planning consent as ‘student accommodation’ as they do not have attached parking facilities. Yet we have a housing shortage. Last time I looked at one of the said buildings, it was being advertised as ‘luxury accommodation’. I’m pleased that The Birmingham Dispatch has started to look at this issue generally.
So it seems that there are empty flats - yet we have a housing shortage and homeless people or people in precarious housing situations finding it difficult to find decent accommodation. Hmmm. I’ve been following with interest the pieces on HMOs too. It’s a BIG issue (unintended reference to a certain paper/magazines sold on the streets). If only someone could sort it out!
The Pride link isn't correct!