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Wednesday 1 Jun 2005

BIRMINGHAM’S ‘IMAGINATION STATION’

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Young people are being asked to come up with futuristic visions of Birmingham’s New Street station as part of a new competition being launched this month – with big cash prizes for the winners. Plans to regenerate New Street station in a £350 million scheme are under way, with one of Europe’s leading technical consultancies appointed to oversee a £3.9 million design and development study earlier this year. Now the New Street station steering group – made up of Advantage West Midlands, Birmingham City Council, Centro,, Network Rail and the Strategic Rail Authority – wants to take a look at ideas young city people have for the future of the station. Young people up to the age of 19 are being asked to create a drawing, painting, sculpture, poem, song or story under the heading “Your station – your ideas”. Entrants can focus on what the station should look like, what facilities it will have, how people would get there – and anything else they like. The pictures will be judged in four age categories: up to six years, 7–11, 12–15 and 16–19, with prizes of £250 given to an overall winner in each age group, plus a further £500 for their school or recognised youth group or club. Prizes are being sponsored by the project’s lead consultant WSP Group, project architects John McAslan and Partners, and retail architects Chapman Taylor. There will also be five runners-up prizes in each category, worth £100 each. All winners will receive a certificate. Entries should be sent in by 7 September to Imagination Station, c/o Baker Goodchild, 257 Great King Street, Jewellery Quarter, Birmingham B19 3AS. The project steering group will give out the prizes at a special lunch in the autumn and an exhibition of entries from the winners and runners-up will be held in Birmingham from October to December.