Birmingham Coach Station

Birmingham Coach Station
The station at night
Other name	Digbeth Coach Station
Location
Locale	Digbeth, Birmingham, England
Coordinates	52°28′31″N 1°53′19″W / 52.47524°N 1.8886°W / 52.47524; -1.8886Coordinates: 52°28′31″N 1°53′19″W / 52.47524°N 1.8886°W / 52.47524; -1.8886
Operation
Opened	1929 (1929)
No. of stands	16
Operators	National Express Ulsterbus Eurolines

Birmingham Coach Station (formerly Digbeth Coach Station) is a major coach interchange in Digbeth, Birmingham, England offering services to destinations throughout Great Britain and also to Belfast and Dublin. National Express, the largest scheduled coach service provider in Europe, has its national headquarters on the site.^[1] The refurbishment was estimated to have cost £15 million.^[2]

It was officially reopened on 18 December 2009 by the then England national football manager Fabio Capello.^[3]

History

The original Digbeth Coach Station, built in 1929 as a bus depot

The original interchange was built on the site by Midland Red in 1929 to be used as a bus depot. This was later converted into Digbeth Coach Station. The original building was dark and dingy as it was not originally intended to serve passengers as a coach interchange.^[4]

Plans were initially developed for a new coach station on Great Charles Street, as Digbeth was considered by National Express to be an "undesirable" location.^[5] However, after the completion of the new Bullring and the planned Eastside redevelopment, it was decided to demolish the old structure and build a new coach station on the same site.^[4]

Outline planning application for a design by MAKE Architects was submitted on behalf of National Express Ltd to Birmingham City Council in March 2006.^[6] However this option was abandoned in favour of a competing design by SBS Architects.^[7]

The final planning application for the design by SBS Architects was submitted on 29 October 2007.^[2]

The old coach station closed in November 2007 for redevelopment and during reconstruction National Express used a temporary site in Oxford Street on the opposite side of Digbeth High Street, called Birmingham Central Coach Station. The new station has been awarded an 'Excellent' rating under the BRE Environmental Assessment Method - the most widely used system for judging how environmentally friendly a building is.

December 2009 - The rear of the new coach station

Services

• National Express offer services to destinations throughout Great Britain
• Ulsterbus offer services to Belfast
• Eurolines offer services to Dublin

References

External links

• October 2007 BBC news article with pictures
• Architects Website

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