Coventry town centre (non football related) (1 Viewer)

Otis said:

Around the cathedral in Coventry is lovely. Unfortunately they designed the city centre in a way so that everyone pretty much circumvents the cathedral area and walks around it rather than through it.

There are 2 shopping projects awaiting. One by the old postal sorting office in Bishop Street and the other by the rail station.

For me Coventry isn't half as bad as people make out. Parts of Brum are terrible and Manchester City centre is a bit of a grubby mess too.

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theferret said:

You can keep up to date with plans and proposals at skyscrapercity.com - the coventry thread is here: http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1553876&page=64

The next big project is Friagate - http://friargatecoventry.co.uk/ - the first building will be going up later this year.

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I don't see (or feel) any improvement with all these so-called squares and these 'public realm improvements' - they are always empty and haven't managed to attract much in the way of businesses and many of them are weird bits of land that have been left over from the post-war planning (Which doesn't really seem to have been finished, just fizzled out) and don't seem particularly well connected - a lot of them are actually streets that were once part of the city's busy, commercial heart, that are now reduced to... paving and badly kept patches. More bollards, paving, patches of grass and benches. As city squares they all... rubbish, really.

But who gives a shit about 'public realm improvements'? The shops are shit, the buildings are a disgrace, the restaurants are mediocre, the access at night is terrible, there's nothing much in the way of entertainment or leisure (And what is can be accessed directly from the ring road with ample parking.), and there's just no real reason to go into the precinct. What for? A fucking windswept empty square with a tatty market stall in it?

It's just ridiculous.

The amount of revenue Coventry city centre is bleeding away through its mediocrity is incredible - as a family of four, we spend a fortune at the weekends in Leamington & sometimes Solihull. I suspect we're not alone. We just don't do Coventry city centre anymore unless we're going for something simple that we know we can get.

Fargo is infinitely more interesting than anything they've done in the city centre for decades. They just need to close down all those fucking fast food joints. I don't want my fucking espresso reeking of the fucking kebab meat. I really hope this succeeds, and a PLAGUE UPON THE AREA WITHIN THE RINGROAD!

Sorry, but we've had 10 fucking years of 'public realm' improvements and endless renderings of squares filled with cafes. The reality is Ladbrokes and Greggs... and new spaces for skateboarders and empty restaurant units.

I think the problem is that the city centre has really gone past the point of no return... Frankly, I think it'd be cheaper to just turn the whole lot into a Uni Campus so we don't have to keep paying for these dreadful public realm improvements. If I hear about another plan for a square I'm going to find the nearest paving slab supplier and buy fucking shares in it.

As for the Ricoh - another mess, another failure surrounded by empty land that no one wants to develop. I think they should have given the fucking thing to SISU, who had plans to bring in proper promoters and get enough visitors to make the land around there viable for development of hotels and other businesses. You really aren't going to attract much with a fucking wedding exhibition and a couple of gigs a year. I've never understood why this city is saddled with so many half-baked developments that never really seem to work.

Answers on a Coventry postcard, please!

And as for Browns being sold to a charity? What sort of lame excuse for a city has what was once its premier bar/eatery being sold to a charity? No commercial interest? Why would there be? It's another dead street - it'll end up being Its A Fucking Scream pub selling 2 pound burgers.

Coventry is like a graph that tends to zero, except here everything tends to mediocrity.

I'm stuck in this situation where I love where I live in Earlsdon, but loathe, detest and hate the city centre. It makes me puke to spend more than 1 hour there. I wander round giving money to random strangers as there's nowhere to spend it. I feel like I need a fucking shower after being in West Orchards due to the reek of fat. I get fed up with cutting through service areas to get back to car parks because everything is so badly planned. About the decent thing I can say about it is that the HMV is somewhat better (I've been splurging on German records on Vinyl in there recently) than it was.

And you can't get a fucking seat in Starfucks because it's full of fucking students using the free fucking wi-fi all day. Haven't they got a fucking library they can use?

(Please apply a ) to this. Ho ho ho.

I don't understand why Coventry is sticking with the precinct though. I would have thought they'd be better building that area as an indoor mall. The precinct is pretty fucking depressing when the wind howls through it. The market could actually form a centrepiece and they could put a roof radiating away from it like the one in the British museum and make an indoor area. Turn the outside of the market into restaurant units and build a new market square somewhere smelly. I just don't see the point of knocking down the precinct in that area and rebuilding it as... a precinct. I'd rather stay indoors. The weather's shit 75% of the year, and all you get in the precinct are those weird globs of wet paper when it rains. I slipped in one once.

Skydome is looking a bit shit these days as well, and it looks like a few of the units are empty.

Coventry not a city centre. It's an absence of a city centre.

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hill83 said:

I lived in Nottingham for three years and it's hands down a better place for things to do than Coventry. Things are slowly improving in Cov though for pub and clubs etc, but most people are so cynical about things they die on their arse within 6 months.

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Jeez... criticism from of all places... Nottingham!!! At least we we have the Luftwaffe to blame for our our 60's built concrete jungle. But Nottingham? THE chav capital! Say what you like about Cov but it has spirit and it has soul! It has a rebel heart and I love it!

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Monners said:

In all fairness the Council are doing a good job in bringing it all up to date but at the same time maintaing the character of the place, but the locals are generally a pretty conservative bunch that don' t embrace change so these things take time. Also, not much deprivation so hard to attract major regeneration funding. Nottingham is a top place by the way I have family there (Cov is still our home City though!)

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