Dave Woodhall ventures into dangerous territory.

I drove in to Birmingham city centre on Tuesday morning. I didn’t intend to – I was going to catch the train but on my walk to the station it started to snow heavily and the last thing I wanted was to hang around a cold, wet platform watching the delays get longer before another cold, wet hike to where I wanted to be. So, the car it was.

You’d have to be living on Mars not to approach the eastern side of the city centre by car with trepidation these days, just in case some invisible force field pushes you into a bus lane. But, knowing the layout of the city I managed with ease. Had I not been so familiar I might not have been so lucky – particularly at the junction of Masshouse Lane and Moor Street Queensway, where going straight ahead takes you into Priory Queensway, venue for the bulk of the bus lane fines. There’s a warning sign, but it’s a bit ambiguous – a dead end symbol ‘Except buses’. There’s certainly no evidence that to stray into the bus lanes, even for a short distance, will bring an £60 penalty.

Knowing the city obviously makes driving easier. However, I also know from experience that an unfamiliar city centre can be hazardous. One eye on traffic signs, another looking out for traffic lights and pedestrian crossings. If you’re lucky you might be able to spare the time to watch for other traffic. But anyway, I manage to get into Corporation Street safely. There’s no available parking meters and with time running out I head for the Royal Angus NCP car park. Just as I’m about to go through the barrier I notice the price, which isn’t advertised until you’ve no choice but to enter. £6.60 for two hours, £12.10 for 2-4 hours. It’s not long (well, a few years) since I had jobs that paid those sort of rates.

And the Royal Angus car park is hardly luxurious. There’s no signs to the lifts, which hold four people. There’s no signs to any other exit than ‘The Shops,’ (Did you know there were shops near the Angus? Me neither) so you can spend more time wandering round trying to find an alternative way out until you realise there isn’t one. I know it’s a car park and unlikely to be a model for gracious living, but for the money NCP charge they could at least make the place look like it hasn’t materialised from a seventies timewarp. Contrast with the car parks near the Mailbox and Bullring –the ‘fashionable’ end of the city centre, where all the money is being spent. They seem reassuringly safe, they’re better lit, have decent lifts and they’re a lot cheaper.

Anyway, I make my meeting and I get back just inside the two hour limit. Three of us cram into the lift; one of the other passengers is a young girl who looks in pain. She’s been to the dental hospital. The third, presumably her mother, says “Expensive here isn’t it?” So that’s two of us who make a mental note to avoid this area in future.

Last October my colleague Steve Beauchampe wrote that the Metro extension and ensuing bus route alterations were destroying trade at the bottom end of Corporation Street https://thebirminghampress.com/2013/10/metro-road-to-nowhere/ Judging by my experience the council seem hell-bent on doing the same for the rest of the city that isn’t close to its prestige developments.