1.
Office
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When used as an adjective, the term office may refer to business-related tasks. In legal writing, a company or organization has offices in any place that it has a presence, even if that presence consists of, for example. In modern terms an office usually refers to the location where white-collar workers are employed, as per James Stephenson, Office is that part of business enterprise which is devoted to the direction and co-ordination of its various activities. Offices in classical antiquity were often part of a complex or a large temple. The High Middle Ages saw the rise of the chancery, which was usually the place where most government letters were written. With the growth of large, complex organizations in the 18th century, the first purpose-built office spaces were constructed. The time and motion study, pioneered in manufacturing by F. W. Taylor led to the “Modern Efficiency Desk” with a top and drawers below. However, by the midpoint of the 20th century, it became apparent that an efficient office required discretion in the control of privacy, the main purpose of an office environment is to support its occupants in performing their job. Work spaces in an office are typically used for conventional office activities such as reading, writing, there are nine generic types of work space, each supporting different activities. In addition to individual cubicles, there are meeting rooms, lounges. Some offices also have an area where workers can make their lunches. There are many different ways of arranging the space in an office and whilst these vary according to function, managerial fashions and the culture of specific companies can be even more important. While offices can be built in almost any location and in almost any building, some modern requirements for offices make this difficult, such as requirements for light, networking. The primary purpose of a building is to provide a workplace and working environment primarily for administrative. These workers usually occupy set areas within the building, and usually are provided with desks, PCs. The structure and shape of the office is impacted by both management thought as well as materials and may or may not have walls or barriers. The word stems from the Latin officium, and its equivalents in various, mainly romance, languages. An officium was not necessarily a place, but rather an often mobile bureau in the sense of a staff or even the abstract notion of a formal position
2.
Newhall Street
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Newhall Street is a street located in Birmingham, England. Newhall Street stretches from Colmore Row in the city centre by St Phillips Cathedral in a direction towards the Jewellery Quarter. Originally the road was the driveway to New Hall occupied by the Colmore family, New Hall was demolished in 1787 after being vacated by the Colmores and used as a warehouse by Matthew Boulton. Newhall Street was so named in 1766, after opening as a street in 1746 called Newport Street. The streets on the estate were named after the children of the family, a number of telephone exchanges have existed on the street, the 1896 Bell Edison Telephone building, Telephone House, the Cold War Anchor Exchange underneath it, and Brindley House. Newhall Street lies in the Jewellery Quarter and Colmore Row and Environs Conservation Areas and has listed buildings. 17 &19 Newhall Street, Birmingham popularly known as the Bell Edison Telephone Building, lock number 9 of the Farmers Bridge flight of the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal stands under Newhall Street, with a lock gate on either side of the bridge. Ordnance Survey 1st Edition Map,1890 Birmingham City Council - Conservation Areas
3.
Birmingham
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Birmingham is a major city and metropolitan borough of West Midlands, England lying on the River Rea, a small river that runs through Birmingham. It is the largest and most populous British city outside London, the city is in the West Midlands Built-up Area, the third most populous urban area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2,440,986 at the 2011 census. Birminghams metropolitan area is the second most populous in the UK with a population of 3.8 million and this also makes Birmingham the 8th most populous metropolitan area in Europe. By 1791 it was being hailed as the first manufacturing town in the world, perhaps the most important invention in British history, the industrial steam engine, was invented in Birmingham. From the summer of 1940 to the spring of 1943, Birmingham was bombed heavily by the German Luftwaffe in what is known as the Birmingham Blitz. The damage done to the infrastructure, in addition to a deliberate policy of demolition and new building by planners, led to extensive demolition. Today Birminghams economy is dominated by the service sector and its metropolitan economy is the second largest in the United Kingdom with a GDP of $121. 1bn, and its six universities make it the largest centre of higher education in the country outside London. Birmingham is the fourth-most visited city in the UK by foreign visitors, Birminghams sporting heritage can be felt worldwide, with the concept of the Football League and lawn tennis both originating from the city. Its most successful football club Aston Villa has won seven league titles, people from Birmingham are called Brummies, a term derived from the citys nickname of Brum. This originates from the citys name, Brummagem, which may in turn have been derived from one of the citys earlier names. There is a distinctive Brummie accent and dialect, Birminghams early history is that of a remote and marginal area. The main centres of population, power and wealth in the pre-industrial English Midlands lay in the fertile and accessible river valleys of the Trent, the Severn and the Avon. The area of modern Birmingham lay in between, on the upland Birmingham Plateau and within the wooded and sparsely populated Forest of Arden. Birmingham as a settlement dates from the Anglo-Saxon era, within a century of the charter Birmingham had grown into a prosperous urban centre of merchants and craftsmen. By 1327 it was the third-largest town in Warwickshire, a position it would retain for the next 200 years, by 1700 Birminghams population had increased fifteenfold and the town was the fifth-largest in England and Wales. The importance of the manufacture of goods to Birminghams economy was recognised as early as 1538. Equally significant was the emerging role as a centre for the iron merchants who organised finance, supplied raw materials. The 18th century saw this tradition of free-thinking and collaboration blossom into the phenomenon now known as the Midlands Enlightenment
4.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
5.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
6.
Martin & Chamberlain
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John Henry Chamberlain, William Martin, and Frederick Martin were architects in Victorian Birmingham, England. Their names are attributed singly or pairs to many red brick and terracotta buildings, john Henry Chamberlain Settled in Birmingham in 1856 and went into partnership with William Martin in 1864. He was the designer in the partnership. The grade I listed Birmingham School of Art, Margaret Street was one of his last commissions and it was finished by William Martin after Chamberlains death. William Martin Was the Birmingham public works architect when J. H. Chamberlain joined him and he continued to work under the name of Martin & Chamberlain after Chamberlains death. He later went into partnership with his son, Frederick Martin, Frederick Martin Son of William Martin, designed the grade I listed former Bell Edison Telephone Building,17 &19 Newhall Street. They were the surveyors for the new Corporation Street from 1878 and they designed police stations, public baths and waterworks. In 1871 Martin & Chamberlain were responsible for St Nicolas Church, Hockley, St Stephens Church, Selly Park, St Johns Church, Sparkhill, built in 1888, and St. Cyprians Church, Hay Mills are further examples of their work
7.
Listed building
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A listed building or listed structure, in the United Kingdom, is one that has been placed on the Statutory List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest. The statutory bodies maintaining the list are Historic England in England, Cadw in Wales, Historic Scotland in Scotland, however, the preferred term in Ireland is protected structure. In England and Wales, an amenity society must be notified of any work to a listed building which involves any element of demolition. Owners of listed buildings are, in circumstances, compelled to repair and maintain them. When alterations are permitted, or when listed buildings are repaired or maintained, slightly different systems operate in each area of the United Kingdom, though the basic principles of the listing remain the same. It was the damage to caused by German bombing during World War II that prompted the first listing of buildings that were deemed to be of particular architectural merit. The listings were used as a means of determining whether a building should be rebuilt if it was damaged by bombing. Listing was first introduced into Northern Ireland under the Planning Order 1972, the listing process has since developed slightly differently in each part of the UK. In the UK, the process of protecting the historic environment is called ‘designation’. A heritage asset is a part of the environment that is valued because of its historic. Only some of these are judged to be important enough to have legal protection through designation. However, buildings that are not formally listed but still judged as being of heritage interest are still regarded as being a consideration in the planning process. Almost anything can be listed – it does not have to be a building, Buildings and structures of special historic interest come in a wide variety of forms and types, ranging from telephone boxes and road signs, to castles. Historic England has created twenty broad categories of structures, and published selection guides for each one to aid with assessing buildings and these include historical overviews and describe the special considerations for listing each category. Both Historic Scotland and Cadw produce guidance for owners, in England, to have a building considered for listing or delisting, the process is to apply to the secretary of state, this can be done by submitting an application form online to Historic England. The applicant does not need to be the owner of the building to apply for it to be listed, full information including application form guidance notes are on the Historic England website. Historic England assesses buildings put forward for listing or delisting and provides advice to the Secretary of State on the architectural, the Secretary of State, who may seek additional advice from others, then decides whether or not to list or delist the building. In England and Wales the authority for listing is granted to the Secretary of State by the Planning Act 1990, Listed buildings in danger of decay are listed on the Historic England Heritage at Risk Register
8.
Architectural terracotta
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In the latter sense unglazed architectural terracotta became fashionable as an architectural ceramic construction material in England in the 1860s, and in the United States in the 1870s. Glazed architectural terracotta was developed a little later, both were generally used as a decorative skin to cover or supplement brick and tiles of similar colour in late Victorian buildings. Terracotta had been used architecturally before this in Germany from 1824 by Karl Friedrich Schinkel, edmund Sharpe designed and oversaw the construction of the first church built almost exclusively of the material, St Stephen and All Martyrs Church, Lever Bridge in Bolton, erected 1842–45. Henry Cole, secretary to the Science and Arts Department of the UK adopted terracotta for the building which is now the Victoria and Albert Museum and then the Royal Albert Hall, alfred Waterhouse used it in his designs when in business in Manchester from 1853 and London from 1865. He used a combination of buff and blue-grey terracotta in his Natural History Museum in London, the colour of terracotta varies with the source of the clay. In Britain, London clay gives a pink or buff colour. Terracotta had the advantage of being cheap and light and it was adaptable to mass-production techniques for stock shapes, although the plaster moulds had a limited capability for re-use. Additionally it could be worked by craftsmen to make custom-sculptured adornments. It was accepted as a material by the Arts and Crafts movement because despite seeming a mass-produced material it was handmade and it had a manufacture time of about eight weeks and each piece had to be made over-size to allow for shrinkage as the clay body dried. To avoid cracking the pieces had to be quite thin and they were filled with concrete as they were applied to buildings. The disadvantage of terracotta, apart from its rather uniform colour in a district, was that it was not easy to keep clean. Bricks, Tiles and Terracotta, An Exhibition on one of the industries of the Wrexham area. James W P Campbell & Will Pryce, Brick, A World History, ISBN 0-500-34195-8 Stratton, the Terracotta Revival, Building Innovation and the Image of the Industrial City in Britain and North America. Article on terracotta in Victorian and Edwardian Terracotta Buildings Understanding and Conserving Terracotta - Dr Michael Stratton Bolton Museums
9.
Edmund Street
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Edmund Street is a street located in Birmingham, England. Edmund Street is one of a series of roads on the old Colmore Estate which originally stretched from Temple Row in the city centre, around St Phillips Cathedral, originally the estate surrounded New Hall which was occupied by the Colmore family. Edmund was one of the sons, other roads on the estate are named after some of the other siblings. It was formerly known as Little Charles Street and Harlow Street, Edmund Street extends from Chamberlain Square at its western end to Livery Street and Snow Hill station at its eastern end. It originally continued westwards to Suffolk Street, where it became Broad Street, much of Edmund Street is in the Colmore Row and Environs Conservation Area and has many listed buildings. There is a length of surviving Birmingham Corporation Tramways track between the two Council House/museum blocks. Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery runs on either side, connected by a bridge over Edmund Street, the Gas Hall and Waterhall are entered from this street. Martin & Chamberlain, c 1875, Grade II* listed, 106-110, Former Scottish Mutual Assurance Society. Frank Barlow Osbourne for W. M. Smythe, Solicitors, now a pub at ground level, Grade II listed. 134, Arts & Crafts, polychrome, brick and terracotta, by Newton & Cheatle,1897, now incorporated into massive office block behind, Grade II listed. 136-138, Venetian Gothic style, brick and terracotta, attributed to J. H. Chamberlain, c 1875. Now incorporated into massive office block behind, Grade II listed, numbers 96, 100-102,158 are also listed buildings. 103, popularly known as the Bell Edison Telephone Building and this building is on the corner of Newhall Street and its current postal address is 17 &19 Newhall Street. 105 &107, the former Birmingham and Midland Ear, Nose and Throat Hospital, 1890-1, Jethro A Cossins, brick and terracotta, Grade II listed. The Birmingham and Midland Eye Hospital, 1883-4 by Payne & Talbot, numbers 121-123, 125-131,133 are also listed buildings. Mason Science College, later a building of the University of Birmingham The original Central Library, the current Central Library had already been constructed next to it
10.
National Telephone Company
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The National Telephone Company was a British telephone company from 1881 until 1911 which brought together smaller local companies in the early years of the telephone. Under the Telephone Transfer Act 1911 it was taken over by the General Post Office in 1912. Three years after the first telephone company, The Telephone Company Ltd. appeared in London, NTC was formed on 10 March 1881, as a provincial subsidiary of the United Telephone Company Limited. The NTC was initially formed to develop and operate services in Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Ulster and parts of Scotland. The UTC developed other similar provincial companies throughout the British Isles between 1881 and 1885, the UTC then wished to create a new company for the amalgamation of all their associated companies. However, the government declined to issue the new company with a licence to operate or to allow the transfer of an existing licence. The National Telephone Company Limited name being retained, in 1886 it built an ornate red brick and terracotta building 19, Newhall Street, now grade I listed, for its Birmingham Central exchange, opened in 1887. In 1899 it commissioned Telephone House in Londons Temple Lane, the building still bears the companys NT logo and some cherubs holding what appear to be old style telephone handsets. Throughout this period the NTC also took over smaller telephone companies, following the Telegraph Acts of 1892 and 1896, NTC trunk lines were acquired and transferred to the Post Office between 1896-97. In 1901, the Postmaster General and the NTC signed an agreement to prevent unnecessary duplication of plant, on 31 December 1911 the NTC ceased to formally trade. The Postmaster General took over the NTC and its telephone systems, the National Telephone Company also issued stamps in various values to enable the public to pre pay for telephone calls made from company premises. Records of the National Telephone Company, c. 1880s–c.1946 are held by BT Archives
11.
Alexander Graham Bell
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Alexander Graham Bell was a Scottish-born scientist, inventor, engineer, and innovator who is credited with patenting the first practical telephone. Bells father, grandfather, and brother had all been associated with work on elocution and speech and his research on hearing and speech further led him to experiment with hearing devices which eventually culminated in Bell being awarded the first U. S. patent for the telephone in 1876. Bell considered his most famous invention an intrusion on his work as a scientist. Many other inventions marked Bells later life, including groundbreaking work in optical telecommunications, hydrofoils, and aeronautics. Although Bell was not one of the 33 founders of the National Geographic Society, he had a influence on the magazine while serving as the second president from January 7,1898. Alexander Bell was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on March 3,1847, the family home was at 16 South Charlotte Street, and has a stone inscription marking it as Alexander Graham Bells birthplace. He had two brothers, Melville James Bell and Edward Charles Bell, both of whom would die of tuberculosis and his father was Professor Alexander Melville Bell, a phonetician, and his mother was Eliza Grace. Born as just Alexander Bell, at age 10, he made a plea to his father to have a name like his two brothers. To close relatives and friends he remained Aleck, as a child, young Bell displayed a natural curiosity about his world, resulting in gathering botanical specimens as well as experimenting even at an early age. His best friend was Ben Herdman, a neighbour whose family operated a flour mill, young Bell asked what needed to be done at the mill. In return, Bens father John Herdman gave both boys the run of a workshop in which to invent. From his early years, Bell showed a sensitive nature and a talent for art, poetry, with no formal training, he mastered the piano and became the familys pianist. Despite being normally quiet and introspective, he revelled in mimicry and he also developed a technique of speaking in clear, modulated tones directly into his mothers forehead wherein she would hear him with reasonable clarity. Bells preoccupation with his mothers deafness led him to study acoustics and his family was long associated with the teaching of elocution, his grandfather, Alexander Bell, in London, his uncle in Dublin, and his father, in Edinburgh, were all elocutionists. His father published a variety of works on the subject, several of which are well known, especially his The Standard Elocutionist. The Standard Elocutionist appeared in 168 British editions and sold over a quarter of a million copies in the United States alone, in this treatise, his father explains his methods of how to instruct deaf-mutes to articulate words and read other peoples lip movements to decipher meaning. Bells father taught him and his brothers not only to write Visible Speech but to any symbol. Bell became so proficient that he became a part of his fathers public demonstrations, as a young child, Bell, like his brothers, received his early schooling at home from his father
12.
Thomas Edison
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Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman, who has been described as Americas greatest inventor. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and the long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. Edison was an inventor, holding 1,093 US patents in his name, as well as many patents in the United Kingdom, France. Edisons inventions contributed to mass communication and, in particular, telecommunications and these included a stock ticker, a mechanical vote recorder, a battery for an electric car, electrical power, recorded music and motion pictures. His advanced work in these fields was an outgrowth of his career as a telegraph operator. Edison developed a system of generation and distribution to homes, businesses. His first power station was on Pearl Street in Manhattan, New York, Thomas Edison was born in Milan, Ohio, and grew up in Port Huron, Michigan. He was the seventh and last child of Samuel Ogden Edison, Jr. and Nancy Matthews Elliott. His father, the son of a Loyalist refugee, had moved as a boy with the family from Nova Scotia, settling in southwestern Ontario, in a known as Shewsbury, later Vienna. Samuel Jr. eventually fled Ontario because he took part in the unsuccessful Mackenzie Rebellion of 1837 and his father, Samuel Sr. had earlier fought in the War of 1812 as captain of the First Middlesex Regiment. By contrast, Samuel Jr. s struggle found him on the losing side, once across the border, he found his way to Milan, Ohio. His patrilineal family line was Dutch by way of New Jersey and his mother taught him at home. Much of his education came from reading R. G, parkers School of Natural Philosophy and The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. Edison developed hearing problems at an early age, the cause of his deafness has been attributed to a bout of scarlet fever during childhood and recurring untreated middle-ear infections. In his later years, he modified the story to say the injury occurred when the conductor, in helping him onto a moving train, Edisons family moved to Port Huron, Michigan, after the railroad bypassed Milan in 1854 and business declined. Edison sold candy and newspapers on trains running from Port Huron to Detroit and he briefly worked as a telegraph operator in 1863 for the Grand Trunk Railway at Stratford, Ontario railway at age 16. He was held responsible for a near collision and he also studied qualitative analysis and conducted chemical experiments on the train until he left the job. Edison obtained the right to sell newspapers on the road, and, with the aid of four assistants, he set in type and printed the Grand Trunk Herald
13.
Postmaster General of the United Kingdom
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The Postmaster General of the United Kingdom was a Cabinet-level ministerial position in HM Government. Aside from maintaining the system, the Telegraph Act of 1868 established the Postmaster Generals right to exclusively maintain electric telegraphs. This would subsequently extend to telecommunications and broadcasting, the office was abolished in 1969 by the Post Office Act 1969. A replacement public authority governed by a chairman was established under the name of the Post Office, in England, the monarchs letters to his subjects are known to have been carried by relays of couriers as long ago as the 15th century. The earliest mention of Master of the Posts is in the Kings Book of Payments where a payment of £100 was authorised for Tuke as master of the posts in February 1512. Belatedly, in 1517, he was appointed to the office of Governor of the Kings Posts. In 1609 it was decreed that letters could only be carried and delivered by persons authorised by the Postmaster General, in 1657 an Act entitled Postage of England, Scotland and Ireland Settled set up a system for the British Isles and enacted the position of Postmaster General. The Act also reasserted the postal monopoly for letter delivery and for post horses, after the Restoration in 1660, a further Act confirmed this and the post of Postmaster-General, the previous Cromwellian Act being void. 1660 saw the establishment of the General Letter Office, which would become the General Post Office. A similar position evolved in the Kingdom of Scotland prior to the 1707 Act of Union, the office was abolished in 1969 by the Post Office Act 1969. A new public authority governed by a chairman was established under the name of the Post Office, from 1691 to 1823 there were two Postmasters General, to divide the patronage between the Whigs and Tories. In 1823 the idea of a Whig and a Tory sharing the post was abolished
14.
General Post Office
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The General Post Office was officially established in England in 1660 by Charles II and it eventually grew to combine the functions of state postal system and telecommunications carrier. Similar General Post Offices were established across the British Empire, in 1969 the GPO was abolished and the assets transferred to The Post Office, changing it from a Department of State to a statutory corporation. For the more recent history of the system in the United Kingdom, see the article Royal Mail. Originally, the GPO was a monopoly covering the despatch of items from a sender to a specific receiver. The postal service was known as the Royal Mail because it was built on the system for royal. In 1661 the office of Postmaster General was created to oversee the GPO, the GPO created a network of post offices where senders could submit items. All post was transferred from the post office of origination to distribution points called sorting stations, initially it was the recipient of the post who paid the fee, and he had the right to refuse to accept the item if he did not wish to pay. The charge was based on the distance the item had been carried so the GPO had to keep an account for each item. The first general post office in London opened in 1643, just 8 years after King Charles I legalised use of the posts for private correspondence. It was probably on Cloak Lane near Dowgate Hill, coffee houses in the City such as Lloyds and Garraways organised private transport of mail among their patrons. The Royal Mail moved its headquarters to Lombard Street in the City in 1678 to better curtail such practices, when the Central London Railway was built in 1900 its nearby station was named Post Office. Smirkes building was felt to be too small by this time, however, in 1912, the former GPO East was demolished, the current headquarters of BT, a post World War II building, occupies the site of the old Telegraph Office. The theory was used to state control of the mail service into every form of electronic communication possible on the basis that every sender used some form of distribution service. These distribution services were considered in law as forms of electronic post offices and this applied to telegraph and telephone switching stations. In the mid 19th century several private companies were established in the UK. The responsibility for the electric telegraphs was officially transferred to the GPO on Friday,4 February 1870, overseas telegraphs did not fall within the monopoly. The private telegraph companies that existed were bought out. The new combined telegraph service had 1,058 telegraph offices in towns,6,830,812 telegrams were transmitted in 1869 producing revenue of £550,000
15.
World War I
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World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War, or the War to End All Wars, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. More than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history and it was one of the deadliest conflicts in history, and paved the way for major political changes, including revolutions in many of the nations involved. The war drew in all the worlds great powers, assembled in two opposing alliances, the Allies versus the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary. These alliances were reorganised and expanded as more nations entered the war, Italy, Japan, the trigger for the war was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, by Yugoslav nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. This set off a crisis when Austria-Hungary delivered an ultimatum to the Kingdom of Serbia. Within weeks, the powers were at war and the conflict soon spread around the world. On 25 July Russia began mobilisation and on 28 July, the Austro-Hungarians declared war on Serbia, Germany presented an ultimatum to Russia to demobilise, and when this was refused, declared war on Russia on 1 August. Germany then invaded neutral Belgium and Luxembourg before moving towards France, after the German march on Paris was halted, what became known as the Western Front settled into a battle of attrition, with a trench line that changed little until 1917. On the Eastern Front, the Russian army was successful against the Austro-Hungarians, in November 1914, the Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers, opening fronts in the Caucasus, Mesopotamia and the Sinai. In 1915, Italy joined the Allies and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers, Romania joined the Allies in 1916, after a stunning German offensive along the Western Front in the spring of 1918, the Allies rallied and drove back the Germans in a series of successful offensives. By the end of the war or soon after, the German Empire, Russian Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire, national borders were redrawn, with several independent nations restored or created, and Germanys colonies were parceled out among the victors. During the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, the Big Four imposed their terms in a series of treaties, the League of Nations was formed with the aim of preventing any repetition of such a conflict. This effort failed, and economic depression, renewed nationalism, weakened successor states, and feelings of humiliation eventually contributed to World War II. From the time of its start until the approach of World War II, at the time, it was also sometimes called the war to end war or the war to end all wars due to its then-unparalleled scale and devastation. In Canada, Macleans magazine in October 1914 wrote, Some wars name themselves, during the interwar period, the war was most often called the World War and the Great War in English-speaking countries. Will become the first world war in the sense of the word. These began in 1815, with the Holy Alliance between Prussia, Russia, and Austria, when Germany was united in 1871, Prussia became part of the new German nation. Soon after, in October 1873, German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck negotiated the League of the Three Emperors between the monarchs of Austria-Hungary, Russia and Germany
16.
Airstrike
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An airstrike or air strike is an offensive operation carried out by attack aircraft. Air strikes are delivered from aircraft such as fighters, bombers, ground attack aircraft. The official definition includes all sorts of targets, including enemy air targets, weapons used in an airstrike can range from machine gun bullets and missiles to various types of bombs. It is also referred to as an air raid. In close air support, air strikes are controlled by trained observers for coordination with friendly ground troops in a manner derived from artillery tactics. On November 1,1911, Italian aviator Second Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti dropped four bombs on two Turkish-held oases in Libya, carrying out the worlds first air strike as part of the Italo-Turkish War, the use of air strikes was extended in World War I. For example, at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle in 1915, however, it was not until World War II that the Oxford English Dictionary first records usage of the term air strike, which remained two separate words for some time thereafter. However, the climate played havoc with the Mosquitos wooden airframe. This period also marked the last combat deployment of British Spitfires, today, airstrike terminology has extended to the concept of the strike aircraft, what earlier generations of military aviators referred to as light bombers or attack aircraft. g. Airstrikes can be carried out for strategic purposes outside of general warfare, operation Opera was a single eight-ship Israeli airstrike against the Iraqi Osirak nuclear reactor, criticized by world opinion but not leading to a general outbreak of war. Such an example of the strike has created new questions for international law. Airstrike campaigns often cause the deaths of non-combatants, including civilians, international law apply the principles of military necessity, distinction, and proportionality. Aerial bombing of cities Aerial warfare Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Strategic bombing Time On Target
17.
International Standard Book Number
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The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an e-book, a paperback and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, the method of assigning an ISBN is nation-based and varies from country to country, often depending on how large the publishing industry is within a country. The initial ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering created in 1966, the 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108. Occasionally, a book may appear without a printed ISBN if it is printed privately or the author does not follow the usual ISBN procedure, however, this can be rectified later. Another identifier, the International Standard Serial Number, identifies periodical publications such as magazines, the ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 in the United Kingdom by David Whitaker and in 1968 in the US by Emery Koltay. The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108, the United Kingdom continued to use the 9-digit SBN code until 1974. The ISO on-line facility only refers back to 1978, an SBN may be converted to an ISBN by prefixing the digit 0. For example, the edition of Mr. J. G. Reeder Returns, published by Hodder in 1965, has SBN340013818 -340 indicating the publisher,01381 their serial number. This can be converted to ISBN 0-340-01381-8, the check digit does not need to be re-calculated, since 1 January 2007, ISBNs have contained 13 digits, a format that is compatible with Bookland European Article Number EAN-13s. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an ebook, a paperback, and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, a 13-digit ISBN can be separated into its parts, and when this is done it is customary to separate the parts with hyphens or spaces. Separating the parts of a 10-digit ISBN is also done with either hyphens or spaces, figuring out how to correctly separate a given ISBN number is complicated, because most of the parts do not use a fixed number of digits. ISBN issuance is country-specific, in that ISBNs are issued by the ISBN registration agency that is responsible for country or territory regardless of the publication language. Some ISBN registration agencies are based in national libraries or within ministries of culture, in other cases, the ISBN registration service is provided by organisations such as bibliographic data providers that are not government funded. In Canada, ISBNs are issued at no cost with the purpose of encouraging Canadian culture. In the United Kingdom, United States, and some countries, where the service is provided by non-government-funded organisations. Australia, ISBNs are issued by the library services agency Thorpe-Bowker
18.
Birmingham City Council
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Birmingham City Council is the local government body responsible for the governance of the City of Birmingham in England, which has been a metropolitan district since 1974. The council headquarters are based at the Council House in the city centre, the council is responsible for running nearly all local services, with the exception of those run by joint boards. The provision of services has in recent years been devolved to several council constituencies. Sixteen Aldermen and 48 Councillors were elected and the Borough was divided into 13 wards, William Scholefield became the first Mayor and William Redfern was appointed as Town Clerk. It was not until 14 January 1889 that another Charter conferred the rank of City on Birmingham, on 9 November 1891, the districts of Balsall Heath, Harborne, Saltley and Little Bromwich were absorbed into the City. The dignity of a Lord Mayor was conferred in 1896 and Sir James Smith Kt was appointed as the Citys first Lord Mayor on 3 June 1896. Such was the expansion involved that the Council Chamber, originally designed to accommodate 80 members, had to be modified to seat the representatives of the new wards, further additions occurred on 1 April 1928 and 1 April 1931. By 1972, there were 39 Wards each represented by an Alderman and 3 Councillors, on 1 July 1986, the title was changed to Birmingham City Council. Part of Bromsgrove District known as Frankley and Kitwell Estates were added to the City on 1 April 1995, a review of the Ward boundaries on 10 June 2004 resulted in an increase from 39 Wards to 40 Wards. The first woman elected to the council, on 1 November 1911, was Ellen Pinsent and she represented the Edgbaston Ward as a Liberal Unionist. She had earlier been co-opted as a member of the councils Education Committee and she stood down from the council in October 1913 upon appointment as Commissioner for the Board of Control for Lunacy and Mental Deficiency. Pinsents time on the council overlapped with that of Margaret Frances Pugh, birminghams third woman councillor, Clara Martineau, was elected on 14 October 1913 in the Edgbaston ward, and served until 1932, when she died, aged 57. Her father was former Mayor Sir Thomas Martineau, Lord Mayor Ernest Martineau was her brother, mary E. Cottrell became the first female Labour councillor in February 1917, when she was elected unopposed to the Selly Oak ward. The first female Lord Mayor, Marjorie Brown, held the post from 1973 to 1974, Theresa Stewart became the first female leader in October 1993, until 1999, and Lin Homer the first chief executive, was in post from 2002 until 2005. The council was run by a Labour administration between 1984 and 2004, with Sir Dick Knowles as Council Leader from 1984 to 1993, followed in turn by Theresa Stewart, and Sir Albert Bore. They lost overall control in 2003 but continued to run the council as a minority administration for the following year, at the election of 10 June 2004, the 121 seats were divided between the Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties. The Conservative and Liberal Democrat groups then formed a governing coalition, in 2005, Richard Mawrey QC ruled invalid Birmingham City Council elections in two wards, Aston and Bordesley Green, held the year before, and required re-votes. He blamed most of the fraud on absentee ballot manipulation
19.
Sutton Coldfield transmitting station
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The Sutton Coldfield transmitting station is a broadcasting and telecommunications facility located in Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, England. It has broadcast terrestrial television signals every day since 1949 and is thus the oldest working television transmitting station in the world, in terms of population covered, it is the second most important transmitter in the UK, after Crystal Palace in London. A new mast was built around 1983 to replace the original structure, a 240. 2m temporary mast was erected alongside the original mast in the spring of 2009 so that work could proceed in raising the height of the original mast by 31m. After four years in service and almost a year after the completion of digital switch over, all analogue TV transmissions ceased on 21 September 2011, as part of the digital switchover. This made it one of the oldest transmitters in the country to formally end analogue broadcasts. With a mast height of 270.5 metres, it is one of the most powerful transmitters in England, the coverage extends as far south as Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire and as far north as Stoke-on-Trent. However, there are many relay transmitters around the Midlands that extend coverage even further, thus mux 6 was transmitted slightly out of band on UHF Channel 55, though this would still be receivable on most B group aerials as this graph makes clear. In July 2007 it was confirmed by Ofcom that Sutton Coldfield would return to an undisputed B group transmitter post-Digital Switchover, a process that was completed on 21 September 2011. An MF transmitter for Radio Birmingham used to be installed at this site and it was eventually replaced with a transmitter at the nearby Langley Mill MF site owned by Arqiva. This transmitter is used for the BBC Asian Network. The station is now owned by Arqiva, analogue television signals are no longer broadcast from Sutton Coldfield as of 21 September 2011. The transmitter is served by a set of 35 local relays and these are, Digital switchover took place at Sutton Coldfield in September 2011. In preparation for this, major engineering works took place at the station, the mast height was increased from 245.0 metres to 270.5 metres and the UHF television antennas were replaced. This was accomplished through the use of a temporary 240.2 metres mast constructed to broadcast all the services so that the main mast could be worked on cold. HD broadcasts were moved from the Lichfield transmitter to Sutton Coldfield on the BBC B multiplex, the Lichfield transmitter ceased the broadcast of all television services, with all six multiplexes being broadcast from Sutton Coldfield. Pawley, Edward, BBC Engineering 1922 -1972, London, BBC. pp 355, ISBN 0-563-12127-0 Cooper, Ray, Tales from a Cold Field. com
20.
BT Tower (Birmingham)
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The BT Tower is a famous landmark and telecommunications tower in Birmingham, England, and is also the tallest structure in the city. Its Post Office code was YBMR, construction of the tower commenced in July 1963 and was completed in September 1965. The tower became operational in December 1966 and was opened by the Lord Mayor of Birmingham. It was designed by the Ministry of Public Building and Works with M. H and it has 26 storeys, housing technical areas and offices, and five levels of circular aerial galleries at the top. The original intention was to build a tower similar to the London one. At one time the Post Office wanted to increase the height from 500 feet and this was refused in order to avoid non-standard procedures for aircraft approaching Birmingham Airport from the north-west. The square design, as built, was proposed for aesthetic reasons by the Chief Architect of the Ministry of Public Building, the tower was designed to be stable in high winds. Channels at each corner funnel the wind to counteract the force of the wind swaying the structure, a stable platform is necessary so that the microwave dishes mounted on the side of the structure keep line of sight with the remote transmitter they are communicating with. There were two steel rails on one wall on which a trolley was designed to run to carry the dishes up to the aerial galleries. The original horn dishes were too heavy for the roof mounted crane to lift and had to be stripped down, the ability to lift dishes was dependent on the weather and to complicate matters, the steel rails only went to the bottom of the first aerial gallery. To get the higher a steel cable system was used that was mounted on poles. When the trolley reached the aerial gallery it had to be disconnected from the rails, in August 2003, the tower was painted an ultramarine blue to cover the existing light brown which had started to discolour. The balconies were painted to stand out from the tower in a shade of blue. On 18 March 2004, Jasper Carrott switched on the night time illuminations of the tower in response to Birmingham City Councils policy of encouraging the illumination of local landmarks, the tower is home to a pair of peregrines, with a webcam installed in 2010. On 5 February 2012 the last of the large analogue aerial dishes was removed following a migration to digital transmission. There are 24 equipment height floors, a Band Branching area - the square section seen from outside which is double the normal floor height followed by 5 aerial galleries. Floor numbering used YBMR/A followed by the floor number +1. The aerial galleries were labelled YBMR/B1-5, list of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Skyscrapernews. coms entry BT Tower Peregrine webcam Birminghams Hidden Spaces, BT Tower
21.
10 Holloway Circus
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10 Holloway Circus is a 427-foot tall mixed-use skyscraper in Birmingham city centre, England. It is named after the developers, Beetham Organisation, and was designed by Ian Simpson, the entire development covers an area of 7,000 square feet. It is the tallest occupied building in Birmingham and the 23rd tallest building in the United Kingdom and it has 39 floors, and is the second tallest structure in the city after the 499 ft British Telecom Tower. The front façade of the building is floor-to-ceiling glass decorated in tiger stripes which are used to enhance the vertical impact, as the apartments were being furbished, an aqua coloured camouflage was also added to these windows with some of the tiger stripes being removed. Coloured lights can be seen underneath the overhang at night, the lower 19-floors are a Radisson Blu hotel, which opened to guests on 16 January 2006 whilst the upper floors were still being furnished. The upper 20 floors contain 158 apartments, there are eight circular concrete columns as well as the core on each floor. The post-tensioned flat plates of the floors are concrete and measure 9 in in thickness. 10 Holloway Circus received 12 points in the 2006 Emporis Skyscraper Awards placing it in position in the top ten. The site chosen was the AEU Building, designed by The John Madin Design Group and completed in 1957, the spires were also removed and replaced by two cones placed on the rear of the tower on top of the stairwells. The overhang at the front was added, the proposed office space was also removed and the planning application was withdrawn. The new design was submitted, however, was withdrawn by the Beetham Corporation after talks over the purchase of the adjacent multi-storey car park with National Car Parks broke down without a deal. This was a surprise to the developers as they had expected to be able to purchase the land and had even included their plans for the site in the planning application. Amendments to the application were made and it was resubmitted in October 2000. A model of the tower was tested in a tunnel with models of surrounding buildings also being included. The ground of the model was accurate to that of the Birmingham landscape. The model passed with few problems and construction of the tower began, construction began in March 2003 with the erection of hoardings around the site allowing clearance work to commence and the construction of a tower crane. The concrete core began to rise and reached a considerable height before the construction of the concrete floor panels began. The transportation of materials to the levels were done using a lift attached to the middle of the curved frontage
22.
Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower
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The Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower, or simply Old Joe, is a clock tower and campanile located in Chancellors court at the University of Birmingham, in the suburb of Edgbaston. It is the tallest free-standing clock tower in the world, although its height is the subject of some confusion. The university lists it as both 110 metres and 99 metres tall, whereas other sources state that it is 100 metres tall, the nicknames Old Joe, Big Joe, or simply The Clock Tower are used by the student population and local residents. A prominent landmark in Birmingham, the grade II listed tower can be seen for miles around the campus, the tower is modelled on the Torre del Mangia in Siena. The original tower designs were amended due to Chamberlains great admiration for the Italian citys campanile, on 1 October 1905, the Birmingham Post reported that Chamberlain had announced to the University Council an anonymous gift of £50,000. In 1940, Sir Mark Oliphant used the tower for radar experiments, the tower remained the tallest structure in Birmingham until 1969, when construction on the 152 m tall BT Tower was completed in the Jewellery Quarter area of the city. However, Old Joe is still one of the fifty tallest buildings in the UK, the asteroid 10515 Old Joe, discovered in 1989, is named in the clock towers honour. There is a superstition that if students walk through the archway when it chimes. The base is solid concrete,50 ft square by 10 ft thick, the clock hands are made out of sheet copper. There are ten floors served by a lift in the SW corner. The tower was built from the inside, without scaffolding, up to the level of the balcony and it is built of Red Accrington brick with Darley Dale dressings and tapers from 29 ft square to 23 ft below the balcony. Owing to its having been built from the inside it was not pointed and had to be pointed in 1914 and was subsequently repointed in 1957 and its weight, solid brick corners linked by four courses of brick resists the overturning wind forces. The original design for Old Joe is thought to have been based upon St Marks Campanile in Venice, the final design is thought to have been inspired by Torre del Mangia which is of similar design but for the clock being placed towards the bottom of the tower. It is also said to have been inspiration for the Eye of Sauron in J. R. R Tolkiens Lord of the Rings due to the clock face. However, The Two Towers themselves are widely accepted as having been inspired by Edgbaston Waterworks, general Article from the Birmingham Magazine, including some history of the Clock Tower A 360° view of the Clock Tower
23.
Alpha Tower
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Alpha Tower is Grade II listed office skyscraper in Birmingham, England. ATV closed in 1982, after which the building became offices, Birmingham City Council took a large tenancy of the building until they vacated in 2010. It is the third tallest building in Birmingham and the tallest office building in Birmingham and it is a Grade A locally listed building. It was nominated for listed building status by the Twentieth Century Society in 2002, however, English Heritage added Alpha Tower to The National Heritage List for England on 31 July 2014. According to English Heritage, The building is one of the most aesthetically successful office buildings in Birmingham with a shaped outline, arena Central Developments sold the building to Catalysts European Property Fund in 2008 for £42.5 million. Birmingham City Council left tenancy in 2010 leaving the building 77% void, nationwide Building Society put the building into receivership in 2012 and put it on the market for £10.25 million in 2013. The building was bought for £14 million in February 2014 by Anglo Scandinavian Estates Group who are set to invest £9 million in a refurbishment of the building, the tower featured in the Cliff Richard film Take Me High for both exterior and interior shots. BirminghamUK. com Skyscrapernews. coms entry SkyscraperPage. coms entry Emporis. coms Entry
24.
Orion Building
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The Orion Building is a 90-metre tall high rise residential building on Navigation Street, Birmingham 5, England. Construction of the began in 2004 with demolition of the previous building on the site. As part of the development, the original façades of some of the buildings have been retained and incorporated into the lowrise sections of the complex. The complex consists of a 28 storey tower with five basement floors and it includes the citys first penthouse which was sold for £1.65 million. The fourth and final phase of the building, being marketed as Sirius, is nearing completion, the first planning application for the Orion Building was submitted on 3 December 2001 to Birmingham City Council. It was approved on 25 April 2002, soon after gaining planning permission, the scheme encountered problems. The original contractor, Carillion, fell out with Crosby Homes, Carillion quit their involvement on the scheme and Taylor Woodrow took over with construction recommencing soon after. Before construction of phases 1 and 2 commenced, all of the 150 apartments had been sold, the next planning application was submitted on 10 October 2002 for the second phase of the scheme. It was approved on July 8,2003, another planning application was submitted for the reuse of 93-97 John Bright Street, a listed building, as apartments and retail. It was submitted on 25 June 2004 and was approved on 2 October 2005, on 5 October 2004 Crosby Homes submitted a planning application to add another four floors to the tower and another storey to the block adjacent to it. Alterations were also made to the layouts of the apartments between floors 10 and 19 to provide a further 29 flats, the planning application was approved on 16 December 2004. The building was constructed in three phases with Phase 1 being the corner on Navigation Street and John Bright Street and the John Bright Street frontage. Phase 2 is a low rise element to the complex that fronts on to Navigation Street whilst Phase 3 is the tower overlooking Suffolk Street Queensway. The 200 apartments within the complex have been designed by John Rocha, the fashion designer, on the ground floor, there are four retail units, one of which is occupied by Sainsburys Local. The tower is illuminated at night by strips of LEDs, the top part of the tower is completely glass. Below this, the tower consists of strips of glass set within pre-cast concrete panels, the pre-cast concrete panels were painted in varying tones of beige after the construction. The reason for this was unknown, however in December 2006 these patches were painted over in a single colour, the final phase of the Orion scheme, is currently under construction. It is being marketed separate to the Orion Building and is named Sirius, as of August 2008, the scaffolding and sheeting covering the façade of the structure are being removed
25.
The Sentinels
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The Sentinels are two 90 metre tall residential tower blocks on Holloway Head in Birmingham, England. They are the tallest purely residential tower blocks in the city and they are surpassed by the newer Radisson Blu directly across Holloway Circus Queensway with 40 floors but this incorporates a hotel as residences. The councillors decided that Birmingham needed a development similar to this and in 1965, after discussions over height, it was decided that the tower blocks should be 32 stories tall, one story taller than the Red Road tower blocks in Glasgow, Scotland. It was decided to construct out of concrete, which was common among tower blocks in the city during that time. They were designed by Bryants Ltd. and both towers were identical though angled differently to provide a different perspective to each block, the project was approved in 1967 and construction of the towers commenced immediately. Cleveland Tower was completed in 1970 and Clydesdale Tower in 1971, upon their opening, they had 488 flats. Recent changes to housing legislation by the incoming Conservative government allowed the Council to offer many of the flats on a cost rent basis to those not on the housing waiting list. Although changes to the Councils letting policy subsequently ended cost rent lettings, Optima then embarked on an extensive refurbishment programme as part of a wider regeneration scheme in the Attwood Green area in Birmingham. The project at The Sentinels involved replacing windows, kitchens, lifts, refurbishing the communal areas and improving security. A new entrance was constructed as well as a feature, lighting scheme, which illuminates the building a blue light at night. In 2004, the Sentinels Residents Association submitted a petition to Birmingham City Council complaining about waste facilities and they also complained about a man, who had previously threatened suicide, being rehoused on a high floor of one of the towers. Beetham Tower, Birmingham List of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Clydesdale Tower on Skyscrapernews Cleveland Tower on Skyscrapernews Optima Community Association
26.
Rotunda (Birmingham)
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The Rotunda is a cylindrical highrise building in Birmingham, England. The Grade II listed building is 81 metres tall and was completed in 1965 and it was refurbished between 2004 and 2008 by Urban Splash with Glenn Howells who turned it into a residential building with serviced apartments on 19th and 20th floors. The building was reopened on 13 May 2008. A part of the James A. Roberts design for the original Bull Ring Shopping Centre included a 12 storey circular office block and this was revised to 25 storeys, abandoning plans for a rooftop restaurant and a cinema. The design was approved and construction began on the 81 metre building in 1961 and it was constructed with aid of a tower crane located to the side of the reinforced concrete central core. Due to its proximity to a tunnel, the main load was built on to a twin ring of piled foundations directly beneath the circular structural core. The floors are supported by the core and perimeter columns, when opened, the podium had shops and its own work of art, The Rotunda Relief at Lloyds banking hall, a circular mural designed by John Poole. The building construction was unique at the time, possibly due to the lack of construction space, the supports for the hydraulic pumps used to jack up the building started to shift towards the New Street Station railway lines so the buildings planned height was never completed. Completed in 1965 as a block at a cost of £1 million during the post-war rebuilding of the Bull Ring. However, suggestions in the 1980s that it should be demolished when the Bull Ring was again redeveloped met with equal, if not greater, in 1974 a pub on the ground floor and basement of the building, was one of the sites of the Birmingham pub bombings. Since its construction and prior to the construction of the new Bullring, in the 1960s and 1970s these advertisements were for the property company MEPC plc, while in the 1980s and 1990s the Rotunda displayed signs for Coca-Cola. During construction of the new Bullring, advertisements on the top of the building advertised the new development, the building also previously had a digital clock showing the time from the top floors. In August 2000, it received Grade II listed building status, from 2004 to 2008, the Rotunda, a Grade II listed building, was refurbished and partially converted for residential use by developer Urban Splash and Glenn Howells Architects. The redevelopment created 232 luxury apartments, including six penthouse suites on the 20th floor, the whole of the 19th floor and one of the penthouses on the 20th floor is run as serviced apartments by the Manchester-based operator, Staying Cool. There are fourteen apartments on each floor, all apartments have been sold, with the final 92 being sold within three hours of their release. Two hi-tech LED illuminations were installed at the top of the building in 2007, both LED boards have been removed to make way for a light box which was approved by Birmingham City Council in late-2007. The façade consists of 72 floor-to-ceiling height glass panes, each placed at 5° to the neighbouring window, on 18 May 2006, strong winds dislodged a pane of glass causing it to fall to the ground resulting in the surrounding area being closed to the public. However, by June 2008, investors were already facing a significant financial loss, rents have been significantly below what was expected, and the value of the flats dropped an average of £25,000 from October 2005 to June 2008
27.
103 Colmore Row
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103 Colmore Row formerly known as National Westminster House is a building on Colmore Row, Birmingham, England. The original building was designed by John Madin and was completed in October 1975 as offices, after National Westminster Bank vacated the building it passed through several ownerships but failed to lease its offices. In 2008 a plan by then owners British Land to demolish the tower and this plan never progressed and the building is now owned by the developer Sterling Property Ventures who successfully applied to have the building demolished and a new tower constructed in 2015. Demolition began in July 2015 and was completed in January 2017, the original building was a 23-storey structure with entrances on Colmore Row and Newhall Street. Designed by John Madin, it is of the Brutalist style, although, the pre-cast concrete panels on the exterior, which were common on commercial buildings of the time, rather than in-situ concrete do make the building differ from classic Brutalism. Designs for the building were first publicised in 1964 and it was remarked that it had drawn inspiration from the University of Pittsburgh by Louis Kahn, the designs showed a two-storey banking hall with a rectangular tower with horizontal ribbon windows. It also showed a service tower facing on to Newhall Street and this design differed significantly to the one that was approved by Birmingham City Council. The scheme also included an office block to the west of the site that was separated from it by an L-shaped courtyard. This office block was reclad and increased to eight storeys in 1996-7 so that it reads as a separate building. The entire scheme was named the Colmore Centre, the first phase of the scheme, which consisted of the construction of the banking hall, was completed in 1969. Construction of the began in 1973 and was completed three years later at a total cost of £3.5 million. The building was constructed so that it was not purely occupied by the National Westminster Bank, however, the building proved difficult to let and was never fully occupied with the only major corporation to take office space in the tower was Eversheds. The building has been vacant since 2003, the banking hall itself has a coffered ceiling of plasterboard covered in gold leaf and Travertine marble floors and skirtings. The exterior is covered in abstract plaster murals and bronze matt ceramic tiles, the lift shaft and two ventilation towers are constructed using brick. The structure was constructed of precast concrete with concrete floor slabs. There are four plant floors at the top of the tower and 100 car park spaces in a basement car park that has been left disused upon the discovery of asbestos. The office block was accessed via a stainless steel surround doorway on Newhall Street, the entrance here appears to be of a later date to the rest of the building. The office block has a core at the centre of each floor, consisting of a large service duct, lavatories, four lift shafts
28.
The Cube (building)
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The Cube is a 25 storey mixed-use development in the centre of Birmingham, England. Designed by Ken Shuttleworth of MAKE Architects, it contains 135 flats,111,500 square feet of offices, shops, a hotel and it is the final phase of The Mailbox development. The site is enclosed by The Mailbox complex, Commercial Street, Washington Wharf apartment complex, as the final stage of The Mailbox development, Birmingham Development Company Ltd. decided to organise a design competition for a building on the site. The winning design was submitted by Birmingham-born architect Ken Shuttleworth of MAKE Architects, plans for The Cube were first submitted to Birmingham City Councils Planning Department on 31 August 2005 for outline planning permission. A six-week public consultation stage was implemented immediately, and the application received outline planning permission from the Planning Committee on 7 February 2006. Full planning permission was granted by the Planning Committee on 7 August 2006, the project was originally scheduled to be completed in 2008, but has been delayed. Construction company, Taylor Woodrow had won the project from Sir Robert McAlpine and Miller Construction, due to other contractors being deterred by the complexity of the design, BDC decided to establish their own subsidiary contractor, BuildAbility. This led Building magazine to dub the project Britains biggest DIY job, employees of Build Ability are being offered a 60% share of the profits of The Cube as an incentive to encourage recruitment. Preparation for construction commenced in 2007 with the clearance of all structures on site, a large diameter auger piling technique was used to install 226,900 mm diameter piles at 1,050 mm spacings and to depths of 24 m. BSL skipped three piles – after installing the first pile – to avoid concrete flowing into the next borehole, due to the presence of groundwater when the piles were bored, a Tremie pipe was used which displaced water to the surface as the bore hole was filled with concrete. Along the western boundary of the site, a further 54 minipiles were installed to a depth of 12 m to further support Washington Wharf. BSL then constructed 30 king post piles to provide the foundation for a ramp which was required for future building works. Each king post pile was formed in a 900 mm diameter pile and these piles ran in two parallel rows down the centre of the site from Commercial Street. With all the piling works complete, excavation commenced on site by local firm ODonnell. A total of 60,000 m3 of earth and sandstone was removed from the site, once this had been completed, BSL returned to construct 12 temporary anchors to hold back the retaining piles on the east side of the site. BSL completed the project at the end of 2007. BuildAbility then subcontracted work for the construction of the shell to ODonnell. ODonnell used a construction technique in partnership with PERI Ltd. to construct the cores, columns
29.
Five Ways Tower
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Five Ways Tower is a 23 storey commercial building on a 2. The building was completed in 1979, several hotels expressed interest in acquiring the building from its owners, since its solid concrete design could be converted into a business class hotel. The building is vacant due to the last tenants evacuating the building due to ill health amongst the workforce, the building has in excess of 100,000 sqft of existing net office space, six lifts, basement storage, and a double height floor at the top. The building has a carpark for approximately 200 cars allocated to the Tower, the buildings architect was Philip Bright of the Property Services Agency. Andy Foster described it as being similar to the work of James Stirling, list of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Emporis entry Skyscrapernews entry
30.
Hyatt Regency Birmingham
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The Hyatt Regency Birmingham is a hotel on Broad Street in the city centre of Birmingham, England. Hyatt Regency Birmingham stands at a height of 75 metres 24 floors and has 319 guest rooms, the hotel has a blue glass exterior facade, and stands across the road from the International Convention Centre. The hotel Food & Beverage offering includes The Gentleman & Scholar Pub and Terrace, Aria Restaurant, the amala Spa & Club includes six treatments rooms and a dedicated nail bar. The leisure facilities of the also include a 16-metre swimming pool, sauna, steam room, Jacuzzi, whirlpool. Hyatt Regency Birmingham has 8 meeting rooms, the hotel was built, and is run by, Hyatt Regency Birmingham Ltd. This company is a partnership between the Hyatt Corporation, Trafalgar House, and Birmingham City Council. The hotel cost £37 million to build, with £1.5 million of that provided by the city, which also donated the building site. In April 2002, the company put the building up for sale. In November 2002, the hotel was sold to London Plaza Hotels for £27.5 million, Birmingham City Council made a £5 million profit on the sale, from its 17. 5% stake in the hotel, which it used to pay off debt. The hotel was constructed to have close ties to the International Convention Centre. This easy to secure link was one factor in attracting the 24th G8 summit to the city, the Hyatt Hotels Corporation bought the hotel out of administration in 2012 for £27 million. In 2014, they made a £6 million investment into the hotel included a new pub with a heated terrace which opens onto Broad Street - The Gentleman & Scholar Pub. In 2016, the hotel was brought by a Middle East investment group for £38.6 million, the hotel will keep its Hyatt Regency branding. The purchaser plans to spend approximately £2.7 million over the three years on improving the venue. Reflected glory in heart of the city, Its one of Birminghams landmark buildings and now its had a multi-million pound facelift
31.
Centre City Tower (Birmingham)
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Centre City Tower is a commercial building in the city centre of Birmingham, England, owned by Bruntwood. Several companies have offices in the building, including Ofwat and Virgin Trains, the buildings architects were Richard Seifert and Partners. The Centre City complex consists of two buildings, the Tower and the Podium, the Podium is a low-rise building that surrounds the Tower base, but there is no direct connection between the two. This arrangement means that the first floor of the Tower is at approximately seventh-floor level when compared with other buildings, when first constructed, the Podium contained at ground level a nightclub and a theatre. The theatre was a requirement of the City Council, who stipulated that a public amenity should be provided as a condition of granting planning permission, before building work commenced, the lost theatre was featured in an article in the UK trade journal New Civil Engineer. This may explain why the street at the back of the building is called Theatre Approach though the next door of the former Tatler Theatre may be a more convincing explanation. The Podium exterior was cleaned in mid-2006 using a power-washer, list of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Emporis entry Skyscrapernews entry
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Snowhill
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Snowhill, as it is spelt by the developers, is a mixed-use development in the Colmore business district, known historically as Snow Hill, in Birmingham, England. The area, between Snow Hill Queensway and Birmingham Snow Hill station, is being redeveloped by the Ballymore Group, the £500 million phased scheme has been partly completed on the site of a former surface car park adjacent to the railway station and Midland Metro terminus. Phase Two, One Snowhill, a 260,000 sq ft,57 m tall building with 13 floors was completed in 2009. The building was acquired by Commerz Real in January 2010, tenants are KPMG, Barclays Banking Group and Solicitors DWF. Phase Three, Two Snowhill, at 75 m in height with 14 floors, was completed in May 2013, the building comprises 313,000 sq ft of office space and 8,000 sq ft of ground floor retail space. Two Snowhill was acquired by Hines in April 2011 The building was developed in conjunction with Ballymore and it is currently occupied by leading international law firm, Wragge Lawrence Graham & Co. HS2 have also become tenants to base Birmingham operations for the new high speed rail project from here, i2 are the final, current tenant to occupy Two Snowhill. Phase Four, Plans for a five star hotel and residential apartments are currently on hold due to financing issues with investors as a result of the economic downturn. No date has been set for work to recommence, in the medium term, the area will be landscaped. Located near to Colmore Row, the site was owned by the Colmore family who owned large areas of land to the north of the present city centre. The family began to establish road layouts and sell plots of land to builders in the 18th century, the site was one of these plots and it became the location of Oppenheims Glassworks. This is the earliest documented glassworks in Birmingham, the glassworks were built in 1757 by Mayer Oppenheim, a London merchant who moved to Birmingham in the same year and who patented red glass in 1755. The building ceased to be used as a glasshouse after 1780/81, the site was later cleared to make way for the new Birmingham Snow Hill station. In 1970, Snow Hill station was redeveloped and the became a surface car park. The four acre site runs along the edge of Birmingham Snow Hill station. To the north, the site is bounded by Great Charles Street Queensway and St. Chads Circus on the Inner Ring Road, to the south the site is bounded by Colmore Circus. It is located between the City Core and the Gun and Jewellery Quarters, the level of the site drops significantly from Colmore Circus to St. Chads Circus and also drops from Snow Hill Queensway to the railway station. There are a number of buildings in the immediate vicinity including 1 Snow Hill Plaza
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One Snow Hill Plaza
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One Snow Hill Plaza is a highrise hotel in Birmingham, England. It is 72 metres tall and was completed in 1973, in 2013 the building was renovated and became a 224-room hotel under the brand Holiday Inn Express. It receives the name Kennedy Tower from the dedicated to John F. Kennedy which was located in Snow Hill Circus until it was removed in mid-2006. It forms a prominent addition on the skyline when viewed from the north, in November 2007, Kenmore Property Ltd. announced plans to demolish the tower and replace it with a 118-metre office tower, by holding a public consultation for the proposal. The plans superseded an earlier proposal for a 12 storey office tower on the site 2 Snow Hill Plaza, the new tower was designed by Hamiltons Architects and provides 54,000 m2 of office space and 4,000 m2 of retail space. This would make it the largest office tower outside London, construction was expected to start in 2009 and to be completed in 2011. However, in November 2009, Kenmore Property Group were placed into administration, rob Caven and Martin Ellis of Grant Thornton UK LLP were appointed joint administrators of 21 of Kenmores companies, and joint receivers of two others. The Snow Hill Plaza site was put on the market by the administrators in March 2010
34.
Quayside Tower
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Quayside Tower is a modern commercial building in Birmingham, England. It is situated on Broad Street, one of Birminghams busiest streets and it forms a prominent part of the Broad Street skyline which consists of many other highrise buildings. Originally built in 1965 to a design by John Madin, it was refurbished in 2003 to a design by Richard Johnson & Associates to give it a fashionable appearance. Ashford Construction stripped all sixteen floors above the podium and added a new curtain walling from the top downwards and this produced a new roof feature which was designed by Watts & Partners. A new reception area was constructed and the 240 space car park was refurbished and it was developed by Kenmore Group. The tower has an area of 11,148 square metres with 8,918.4 square metres available for let once refurbishment was completed. List of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Emporis entry Skyscrapernews entry
35.
Colmore Gate
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Colmore Gate is an office and retail building in Birmingham, England. An example of early 1990s architecture by the Seymour Harris Partnership, the shaft is on the outside of the building. The design blends a traditional look with modern materials and style and it is situated in the heart of the business district of Birmingham. The building is home to large companies. The building sits on the footprint of the old Greys department store. The building was constructed after the developers bought the patch of land off another developing company whilst they were constructing a building there, the structure of a building was on the site and it was taken down before construction of Colmore Gate began. List of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Emporis entry Skyscrapernews entry
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The McLaren Building
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McLaren is a 69-metre,21 storey tall office building in Birmingham, England. Designed by Philip Bonham Associates and built in 1972, it is a thin brown office building, originally it housed part of the staff training department of Midland Bank, now HSBC. The building is owned by property company Bruntwood who purchased it from the Birmingham Alliance in 2008 and it is situated on the edge of two redevelopment sites to the south and east. Masshouse to the east and Martineau Galleries to the south are due to be redeveloped at some time in the future, the entrance is on Priory Queensway, and near the junction with Moor Street Queensway. During 2009 the building was renovated with its exterior glazing given a fresh look, as at December 2012 the building is 65% occupied
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Metropolitan House
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Metropolitan House, also known as 1 Hagley Road, is a commercial building that is being developed into apartments in Birmingham, England. It is situated on the A456 Hagley Road at Five Ways and it was designed by John Madin. The building hosts several radio transmitting antennas on its roof and these include, Capital Birmingham -102.2 MHz FM CE Digital - Block 11C,220. Seven Capital acquired 1 Hagley Road in August 2013 and optimised the planning consent to 271 flats with no alterations to the exterior of the building, one, two and three bedroom apartments will be marketed at between £130,000 and £250,000. List of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Emporis entry Skyscrapernews entry Transmission Gallery entry
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Edgbaston House
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Edgbaston House is a highrise commercial building in on Duchess Place, Birmingham. It was built by Laing Development Co Ltd. and the engineers were Ove Arup. It was the result of work by Calthorpe Estates to attract businesses to the Hagley Road and it is part of the Duchess Place estate which consists of office blocks totalling 200,000 sq ft. They are owned by the Kenmore Group, who acquired the estate from Chelsfield, tenants of the building include the Islamic Bank of Britain and various medical groups. List of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Emporis entry
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The Colmore Building
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The Colmore Building, formerly known as Colmore Plaza, is a 14-storey office building in the Colmore Business District area of Birmingham City Centre. The Colmore Building is a Grade A office building spread over 14 storeys and it can accommodate lettings of up to 104,000 sq ft across 23,000 sq ft floor plates and has a BREEAM environmental and sustainability rating of Excellent. There are around 500 companies located in the Colmore Business District, employing up to 35,000 people, AshbyCapital secured an £80m loan with AgFe to fund the deal. AshbyCapitals other investments include 200 Aldersgate, a 434,005 sq ft building in the City of London. In January 2016, AshbyCapital announced a £3. 5m enhancement programme and relaunched the building under the new name, the Colmore Building website AshbyCapital website Colmore Business District website
40.
Jurys Inn Birmingham
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The Jurys Inn is a hotel building on Broad Street, Birmingham, England. Built using concrete cladding and steel joists, this building was part of the plan to redevelop Birmingham in the 1960s, construction commenced in 1974 and was completed the following year to a design by Ian Fraser of John Roberts & Partners. It is one of the tallest buildings on Broad Street and forms a prominent part of the city skyline when viewed from the south and it is a rare example of Brutalist architecture in Birmingham, with other similar examples being Birmingham Central Library and New Street Station Signal Box. The hotel itself is a 3 star branch with 445 rooms, on the ground floor is a pub and a restaurant. The hotel opened on February 1,1999 after a £12 million refurbishment from a building into a hotel. It was bought by the Jurys Inns hotel chain in 2001 for £42 million, list of tallest buildings and structures in Birmingham Bartlam, Norman, Carl Chinn
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Baskerville House
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Baskerville House, previously called the Civic Centre, is a former civic building in Centenary Square, Birmingham, England. The site was occupied by the home of John Baskerville. He was buried nearby in the area which was known as Easy Hill, when the construction of a canal through the area was proposed, Baskervilles body was exhumed and found to be in good condition. It was placed on display to the public before being buried at Christ Church, the site adjacent to the canal, on the site of Baskerville House, was purchased by the Birmingham Aluminium Company who constructed Baskerville Basin. Gibsons Basin was also constructed nearby to serve a rolling mill, the city council bought the land in 1919 for a new Civic Centre. Baskerville Basin was filled in but Gibsons Basin remained, however, in 1936, Winfields Ltd decided to relocate to Icknield Port after taking over Vivians Rolling Mills. They abandoned the remainder of Gibsons Basin to Birmingham City Council who filled it in for their Civic Centre plans, in 1926, the city council organised an open competition for the new layout of the Civic Centre, however, many of the designs were deemed Too Ambitious. As a result, the city engineer was asked to work with the architects of the Hall of Memory, S. N. Cooke, cecil Howitt of Nottingham was asked to design the first building, which was to become Baskerville House. This was approved in 1936 and construction began in 1938, world War II halted construction of Baskerville House, and after the war the use of Roman Imperial imagery on public buildings went out of fashion. A1941 model of the proposed Civic Centre, designed by William Haywood, the building is decorated with the Coat of arms of Birmingham. Formerly offices for parts of Birmingham City Council, including the Planning Department and Economic Development Department, remained vacant for several years after the City Council vacated the property in the spring of 1998. The initial refurbishment plan proposed conversion to a Radisson Edwardian Hotel, a feasibility study into whether it was possible to locate the Central Library was carried out, and the building was deemed to not be suitable as it would not be strong enough to hold all the books. The building was sold to Targetfollow who proposed to convert into offices. This was approved and it was gutted and extended two floors upwards to provide office space on seven floors, and a health club in the basement. Work started in August 2003 and was completed in early 2007 at an estimated cost of £30 million, there is 195,108 sq ft of office space within the building with floorplates of 27,000 sq ft. The two new floors are of steel and glass, a lighting scheme was added to the exterior by Hoare Lea Lighting of the Hoare Lee group who were also commissioned for other aspects of the build. The building won the Commercial Development of the Year award at the Midlands Property Week awards in July 2007, the building also won the Midlands and East Anglia regional award in the Refurbished/Recycled Workplace category at the British Council for Offices awards in October 2007. A statue of King Edward VII was moved to a plinth near the South-West corner of the building in November 2010, a sculpture of the Baskerville typeface, Industry and Genius, in honour of John Baskerville stands outside the main entrance to Baskerville House in Centenary Square
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Steelhouse Lane police station
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Steelhouse Lane police station is a police station in central Birmingham, England. It was built for the Birmingham City Police and opened in 1933 as their Central Police Station and it remains in use by their successor, the West Midlands Police, but is proposed for closure and sale. The carvings over the entrances, including the coat of arms of Birmingham, are by the local sculptor William Bloye, the station sits on a plot of land at the rear of the former Victoria Law Courts, which was originally acquired for the extension of the court building. The station sits in Birmingham City Councils Steelhouse Lane conservation area, a tunnel links the cell block to the courts. The station is now a divisional headquarters for the West Midlands Police, the City of Birmingham Orchestra, held its first rehearsal in the band room at the old station, at 9. 30am on 4 September 1920. For around sixty years, until closed in 2005, the station housed a private bar, the police station closed for the final time on Sunday 15 January 2017
43.
Chamberlain Clock
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The Chamberlain Clock is an Edwardian, cast-iron, clock tower in the Jewellery Quarter of Birmingham, England. It was erected in 1903 to mark Joseph Chamberlains tour of South Africa between 26 December 1902 and 25 February 1903, after the end of the Second Boer War, the clock was unveiled during Chamberlains lifetime, in January 1904 by Mary Crowninshield Endicott, Joseph Chamberlains third wife. Standing at the junction of Vyse and Frederick Streets with Warstone Lane, it is now a local landmark, Chamberlain had been a resident on Frederick Street and had also helped jewellers through his campaign work to abolish Plate Duties - a tax affecting jewellery tradesmen of the time. The timepiece was originally powered by a winding handle. It was later adapted to electricity but fell into disrepair and lost its chime and it was fully restored in 1989
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Chamberlain Memorial
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An inauguration ceremony was held on 20 October 1880, when Chamberlain himself was present. For the creation of the monument, £3,000 of public funds were raised and it is 65 feet tall and in neo-gothic style, reminiscent of the Albert Memorial. It bears a 50 centimetres portrait medallion of Chamberlain by Thomas Woolner on the south side, the carvings of the capitals and the crocketted spire were done by Samuel Barfield of Leicester, John Henry Chamberlains favourite sculptor. Salviati Burke and Co. of Venice were commissioned to do the mosaics after their success with the Birmingham Council House, and during whose Mayoralty many great public works were notably advanced. And mainly by whose ability & devotion the Gas & Water Undertakings were acquired for the town to the great, like the Chamberlain Memorial, the Chamberlain Clock in the centre of the Jewellery Quarter was also erected during Chamberlains lifetime. In the late 1960s, the pools around the fountain were removed, the Portland stone spire underwent a major clean in 1994. Many sculptors and architects took to the memorial with dissatisfaction, John Roddis, a local sculptor, described it as an architectural scarecrow and a hash of ornamental details. Nikolaus Pevsner also commented on the memorial in 1966 as a combination of shapes. Historic England, Joseph Chamberlain Memorial, National Heritage List for England, retrieved 28 October 2016
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Council House, Birmingham
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Birmingham City Council House in Birmingham, England, is the home of Birmingham City Council, and thus the seat of local government for the city. The first-floors exterior balcony is used by visiting dignitaries and victorious sports teams and it is located in Victoria Square in the city centre and is a Grade II* listed building. The Council House has its own postcode, B1 1BB, the side of the building, which faces Chamberlain Square, is the entrance and façade of the Museum and Art Gallery which is partly housed within the same building. The open space which is now Victoria Square was once occupied by Christ Church, the land on which the Council House and adjacent Museum and Art Gallery are located was purchased in 1853. This land consisted of Ann Street which was home to such as the Cabinet of Curiosities. The building had a tower topped with a flagpole. The top was castellated and the walls were whitewashed and adorned in advertisements, the last tenants of the building were the Suffield family, ancestors of J. R. R. Tolkien. The land was earmarked for development, however constant financial difficulties put all development on hold until 1871 when the council agreed to build offices on the site. A design competition was established and the council received 29 entries, however a decision was delayed by further financial difficulties. The council was split over the Gothic entry by Martin & Chamberlain. Thomasons design was chosen however amendments to the art gallery entrance, the clock and tower are known locally as, Big Brum. Construction commenced on the building in 1874 when the first stone was laid by the then mayor Joseph Chamberlain, the building was completed in 1879 and cost £163,000. A debate was held to decide upon the name of the building with the options being The Municipal Hall, the Council House was extended almost immediately, 1881–85. The architect was again Yeoville Thomason and this was a combined Art Gallery and the home of the corporations Gas Department whose budget subsidised the building as legislation limited the expenditure of ratepayers taxes on the arts. Above the main entrance, which faces Victoria Square, is a mosaic by Salviati Burke, above that, the pediment shows Britannia receiving the manufacturers of Birmingham. The carved decoration on the entablature includes green men, on 9 August 1902, The Council House, along with the Town Hall, was illuminated in celebration of the coronation of King Edward VII. The Council House was extended a second time 1911-1919 by the building of a new block to the north and connected to it by an intricately designed archway. The archway or bridge resembles slightly The Bridge of Sighs in Venice. This contains much of the Museum and Art Gallery and, on its ground floor, many memorials are housed within the Council House
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Edgbaston Waterworks
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Edgbaston Waterworks lies to the east of Edgbaston Reservoir, two miles west of the centre of Birmingham, England. The buildings were designed by John Henry Chamberlain and William Martin around 1870, the engine house, boiler house, and chimney are Grade II listed buildings. The site is operated by Severn Trent Water, despite the close proximity to Edgbaston Reservoir there is no current or historical connection of the water. This waterworks manages domestic water supply whereas the reservoir was built to feed the canal system
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Tyseley Energy from Waste Plant
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Tyseley Energy Recovery Facility is a waste incineration plant in Birmingham, UK. It was built in 1996 by Veolia to a design by Faulks Perry Culley & Rech, the plant has become a notable building in Birmingham with a lighting scheme that illuminates the plant during the hours of darkness. It was built to comply with the European emissions standards that came into force in 1996, Veolia benefits from Levy Exemption Certificates for the element of energy which is produced from renewable sources. This provides income to the City Council, the plant was opposed by Birmingham Friends of the Earth for contributing to climate change, causing air pollution and reducing recycling rates in the city. The ERF operates 24 hours a day for 365 days a year and it takes around 350,000 tonnes of waste produced by the city annually and burns it along with natural gas to produce electricity, of which 25MW is fed into the National Grid. It is a plant with each boiler designed to process 23.5 tonnes of rubbish per hour. It has a turbo-generator which exports 25MW to the National Grid, the ERF also recovers several thousand tonnes a year of ferrous metals for recycling from the process
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Hall of Memory, Birmingham
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The scheme was abandoned after the arrival of World War II with only half of the planned Baskerville House having been built. Construction had cost £60,000 and was funded through public donations, the four statues around the exterior are by local artist Albert Toft. They represent the Army, the Navy, the Air Force, the interior features three carved bas-relief plaques by William Bloye representing three tableaux, Call, Front Line, Return. The hall was upgraded on 27 October 2014 to a Grade I listed building from its previous Grade II. During the Birmingham Blitz, on the night of 11 December 1940, all but the tower and classical west portico of St. Thomas Church. The First World War Memorial colonnade, which had been alongside the Hall of Memory in 1925, was relocated there when Centenary Square was laid out 1989. Pevsner Architectural Guides - Birmingham, Andy Foster,2005, ISBN 0-300-10731-5 Public Sculpture of Birmingham including Sutton Coldfield, George T
