The site of the old BBC studios has been clear for more than four years. The University has plans for a Science and Technology Park which is apparently due in 2015, but the only pages I found on their website with any dates refer to nothing later than 2006. And (at the time of writing) the Birmingham City Council‘s search engine is broken, so not very fruitful.

I’ve posted a question to the new Help Me Investigate website (currently in private beta, so for now you need an invitation to join), in case anyone has light they can shed on it.

Knowing me I may have been completely oblivious to frenetic development activity, and that there’s actually an enormous glass cathedral of science now sitting where the BBC used to be. Hopefully though I haven’t missed much, and this blog post is still relevant.

So are we still to expect a glossy university science building bang opposite the Nature Centre (handy for medical experiments), or may we use the waste ground to play on?

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It’s quite an old tree, and clearly the footpath has been built around it:

Tree in the middle of the pavement on Pershore Road

I often wonder why it’s there. The trees are otherwise in a deliberate line, equally distanced, along the road. Suddenly this anomaly springs up, apparently after the road was built (it’s a similar age to the other trees) but before the footpath was laid.

But maybe it’s not as random as it looks. The photograph doesn’t show it, but in the playing field to the right is another tree which could be a continuation of the line started by the two in the forefront of the picture:

The blue line to the left in the image shows the line of trees along the road; the yellow line to the right shows the possible line of trees through the playing field

I’m guessing there must be a preservation order on the trees, because otherwise the police training centre (whose playing field it is) would surely have removed theirs.

The thing that fascinates me (presuming my hunch is correct) is the purpose of that second line of trees: did it mark something out, and – if so – what? It’s not perpendicular to the other so it can’t have been marking out a square grid; and there’s nothing to suggest what may have been there before.

I know, I should look at old records and plans and historical whatnot. Maybe I will.

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