[Closed] Birmingham - only UK city in 'Top 10 cities in the world'

I used to go to Birmingham a lot as a kid, as it was the nearest big city to where I grew up. I remember it being a dirty, concrete, grim sort of place.

A couple of years ago, I went back for the first time since the 70's. Couldn't equate it to the place that I remembered as a kid. I go back at least once a year now. Love the place.

"there's no pretending that Birmingham is packed with interesting sights - it isn't - but, along with its first-rate restaurant scene and nightlife, it's well worth at least a couple of days."

easily enough to pop it into the top 10.

You can stick it on as many lists as you like. Its a shit-hole

Been to Birmingham once. Got bricks thrown at my head by local scallies on new years day walking along the canal bank. Little desire to go back...

How can they miss out London, the number of beautiful and interesting buildings (in the posh central bits) is just huge. I love walking rather than using the tube, you come across loads of lovely streets.

Well it us a "Rough Guide".

Actually I think the centre has scrubbed up fairly well in recent years. The canalside area is pleasant.

I've only ever bought one Rough Guide, the Spanish one, I clearly had nothing in common with those who wrote it. Malaga FFS !

Is it April 1st?

They've picked the UK's worst big city. Genius.

What were the measures that meant a city gets on that list. It's not the usual sort of places you'd expect.

Nice to see Wellington get a shout. It is normally ignored in travel guides as there are no Hobbits and you can't tie a bit of elastic to your leg and jump off a bridge. But it is easily the best city in New Zealand in terms of night life and culture, some great biking too. See the film What We Do in the Shadows re the night life.

It wouldn't make my top ten of British cities.

Surely theres been some financial incentive behind that list. So Brimingham is somehow better than Rome, Madrid, Barcelona, London, New York, Vancouver, Paris, Venice, Amsterdam, Edinburgh, Los Angeles, Istanbul...

With the exception of Hamburg and maybe windy wellington, I have no desire to visit any of the other places at all. Unfortunately work takes me to brum quite a lot. It's not that bad, but no way at all is it one of the worlds best cities. Not even in the top 50.

I think they missed a bit.... 🙂

World's top 10 cities for getting mugged

New Orleans? Or the Blackpool of the US, as I like to call it.

Article designed to grab headlines & exposure more than have meaningful content.

I dont actually mind Birmingham but it would Probably stuggle into my Top Ten of Cities to Visit in the UK & Ireland

Surely theres been some financial incentive behind that list.

footflaps - Member

How can they miss out London...

sometimes it's nice to look past the obvious every now and then?

but [i]Birmingham[/i]?

aren't rough guides designed for backpackers?

Grew up near Birmingham. Have some fond memories of it way back when it was 'authentic'. We as teenagers used to play gigs there in some proper shabby pubs and venues - but it was a different time- ie interesting with loads of little shabby alleyways and curious old places, tiny record shops, antique clothes, the old row market, etc. I'm not at all a big city person but don't see Birmingham today as notably good or bad either way in comparison with other similar sized cities - ie it's sprawling and overpopulated, it has parks, and airports, and train stations, and gyms and kebabs and Starbucks and theme bars and malls, and museums and architecture and multiplexes and pollution and the homeless and pigeons.

I much prefer to visit London or Dublin, seems having a big river lends a town a certain panache and history. Birmingham has maybe suffered an image crisis for being historically/primarily a centre of industry and I don't think that's very interesting to most people as cities connected to Royalty and the Arts tend to fare better in popular city polls.

Mark me down as 'surprised' and slightly misty eyed for old Brum.

Brum is a phenomenal city, really it is. For those that haven't been for a while I urge you to go again, perhaps with a local as a guide, and go and see what has changed. Compared to the dull, concrete hole it was in the 90's it really has turned itself round.

However, saying all that, is it one of the top 10 cites in the world? No.

Brum is a phenomenal city, really it is. For those that haven't been for a while I urge you to go again, perhaps with a local as a guide, and go and see what has changed. Compared to the dull, concrete hole it was in the 90's it really has turned itself round.

Is it April 1st?

Nizwa??!! WTF . In the top ten cities of the world? 😀

Malaga? Johannesburg? Belgrade? Why not Granada, Cape Town and Budapest? All much nicer cities.

Wellington is great. Lived there for 14 years and loved every windy wobbly second of it. _GREAT_ biking now as well, council have been super supportive on trail building in town.

I live by Birmingham and regularly visit, not sure what they were looking at to put it on that list but apart from maybe a square mile in the very city center the rest is a dive.

Birmingham: Where Luftwaffe failed, the council succeeded.

I reckon this list is really the "Top Ten world cities you wouldn't really think are that good but actually are", so basically discounting the 20 or so cities people know are good (London, Paris, Prague, New York etc).

I'm from near Birmingham and I've lived in a fair few places, three years of uni in Manchester, one in California, London and Lancaster for work, a couple of years in Lyon and now Paris. I've always said Brum is up there among the best, the real difference being you need to know where you're going, i.e. be a local or have a local guide. There's no "tourist trail" to speak of, and if there was it'd be crap.

I'd like to hear what those saying it's not in their top 10 in the UK (or saying it's a "shithole") really think set apart the likes of Liverpool, Newcastle, Manchester, Leeds etc above Birmingham. For me it's well ahead in terms of music, nightlife and food.

jimoiseau, you speak the truth there.

Johannesburg? Seriously?

ransos - Member

They've picked the UK's worst big city. Genius.

Brum puts its weight behind very particular things in terms of culture and tourism. It likes mainstream and it likes big. Thats double edged - if those things are the things you like then Birmingham has everything you want, but its at the expense of the grass roots - or more particularly its at the expense of a bridge between the grass roots and the big league.

Top 10 that aren't necessarily as bad as you might think, maybe.
But it's surely just to generate a bit of controversy. I don't believe for a second that anyone at Rough Guide really thinks Birmingham and Wellington are in the top 10 cities in the world. And I liked Wellington a lot!

I can't take that list seriously if its listing Yangon as a top 10 city.

Its a dive. With very good reason, given the political history, But still a (very interesting) dive.

That has to be a joke right? It wouldn't make a top ten cities in the West Midlands list !

Birmingham is shite and I used to live in Coventry.

Budapest >> Brum

Don't care what Brum has, plenty places have more and better. If the best headline pic they could come up with was the Bullring then that just says it all really.

Birmingham has been named as one of the top 10 cities in the world by travel handbook company Rough Guide.

It joins Johannesburg, New Orleans and Wellington on the list, described by the firm as "rundown places to travel in 2015".

According to the guide, the conurbation has "grown the squalor and misery of its boom years"...

FTFY BBC

Is there any city on that list that isn't in some state of arcitectural disarray? Wellington's just about flat and New Orleans probably still isn't much better. I'm surprised they never included Port Au Prince, they would have enough in common...

That has to be a joke right? It wouldn't make a top ten cities in the West Midlands list !

Wolverhampton FTW!

TheDoctor - Member

That has to be a joke right? It wouldn't make a top ten cities in the West Midlands list !

Birmingham would struggle to make the top-ten list of places called Birmingham.

but, along with its first-rate restaurant scene and nightlife, it's well worth at least a couple of days."

Well it's changed since I was there on Friday night then!

Wellington, Malaga and Hamburg are all fantastic cities, It's refreshing to see a list that doesn't contain the obvious and quite frankly boring options such as London.

That list does Wellington, which is excellent, a disservice.

They've picked Birmingham as it would cause a reaction and get them more publicity to hawk their shite lists.

Birmingham is a much better place than you expect it to be. I have visited a number of times with a 'local guide'. It appears to be a pleasant place to live, with some nice bars and restaurants.
However, it's probably not even made my top 5 of cities in England, never mind the UK and certainly not the top 10 of the world.
Just because a place is not as bad as you think it'll be doesn't make it suddenly brilliant.

I've been to some nice and some dodgy places over the years and I can honestly say Birmingham on a sat night walking with my family was one of the worst. I'd sooner walk through Newcastles bigg market on a derby day with a Sunderland top on!

Birmingham would struggle to make the top-ten list of places called Birmingham.

Teaspout!

Birmingham is a much better place than you expect it to be.

As you can tell from the general tone of the answers, thats really not that high a watermark

A mate of mine was at uni there recently. He came home every weekend. When asked why, he just looked at me incredulously and said 'have you been to Birmingham?'

russ295 - Member
I'd sooner walk through Newcastles bigg market on a derby day with a Sunderland top on!

Walked through Bigg Market the other day at 11pm. Ya, still the same lively crowds, why do the girls have to keep shouting? 😆

I would rate Newcastle higher than Birmingham anytime.

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Any old skaters know exactly how much of a dump Brum used to be as it was our playground. Very little of the original dump Brum is left in the central area.

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Interestingly I didn't think toooooo much of Wellington when I was there.*

It's still paradise compared to Birmingham tho!

*It's still a lovely place on the waterfront, just an oddly set up city with more than its fair share of hookers and sketchy people.

*It's still a lovely place on the waterfront, just an oddly set up city with more than its fair share of hookers and sketchy people.

They're called hipsters apparently

Squirrelking I think you have the wrong Wellington in mind, the one that is Christchurch, I imagine.

Wellington is very hilly and a long way from being in "architectural disarray" it fact it has the largest wooden building in the Southern Hemisphere. So suck on that.

Another tedious list generated purely for PR.

I'm from Birmingham originally and now live in Manchester via several other cities.

Birmingham is comfortably one of the worst big cities in the UK for me. I've had a few nights out there recently and must be going to a different city to everybody else because the nightlife was woeful. The Custard Factory is alright but that's about it really.

The main accolade seems to be that it's so much better than it used to be. well that's definitely true but given what a dump it was before it's hardly surprising.

I have to admit to being surprised at how much better Birmingham is now than when I grew up nearby in the 80s/early 90s. I have memories of the annual christmas shopping trip to Birmingham and the horror that was the old Bullring. We avoided the place most of the time.

Roll on about 18 years and we started having 6 monthly team away days in Birmingham through work. We usually stay near the canal (Mailbox/Brindley Place) and it's far more pleasant than I expected. I do remember even the locals struggling to think of somewhere decent for us to go after our meal though.

My expectations were VERY low though!

I think Birmingham is a fantastic city, being a Wolverhampton lad and that........ 😆

[url= http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/uk/11176858/Britains-10-best-cities.html?frame=3079904 ]Telegraph's top 10 UK cities[/url]

Oh look, no Birmingham.

Obviously a bit of a stunt, but a slightly odd list. Must be hard putting pointless lists like that together anyway. Not easy to compare totally different cities in totally different countries.

i like Brum. it's like any place you go to, to make the most of what it has to offer you have to research and plan...

here's a link with some good stuff if you should ever venture there...

[url= http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/entertainment/articles/2014-10/13/birmingham-city-guide-best-hotels-restaurants-bars-barbers ]brum stuff[/url]

Squirrelking I think you have the wrong Wellington in mind, the one that is Christchurch, I imagine.

Wellington is very hilly and a long way from being in "architectural disarray" it fact it has the largest wooden building in the Southern Hemisphere. So suck on that.

Such a great city I got it confused with somewhere else. Says it all really 😛

Hah, just realised I committed the cardinal sin of getting the islands mixed up...

As a Brummie who has spent a lot of time in Jburg, I find it baffling that either make the list!

Anyone who thinks that Birmingham shouldn't be in the list clearly hasn't lived in Acocks Green.

Gutted France didn't make the list. Great city.

Birmingham is the best big city in the UK. Fact.

Show me anywhere else you can live and be in the peaks or North Wales in an hour and a half, lakes or Devon in 3 and if you really can't be bothered to drive, cannock in 30mins!

Also excellent for the annual Scotland and Alps trips. That there London is 5 hours from anywhere, and I can probably get from birmingham to Dover on a Friday night in the same time it takes to get from London to the m25.... So in summary, Brum is a great place to live if you don't want to be there!

lots of exciting development on the way for brum

paradise...in fact

[url= http://www.birminghampost.co.uk/business/business-news/road-paradise-mapped-out-11-8306746 ]paradise[/url]

Birmingham is nowhere near as bad as it was, but it's still struggle to make my top-10 cities in the UK list never mind top-10 in the world.

Birmingham is the best big city in the UK. Fact.

Show me anywhere else you can live and be in the peaks or North Wales in an hour and a half, lakes or Devon in 3 and if you really can't be bothered to drive, cannock in 30mins!

So what you're saying is, the best thing about Birmingham is that you can leave it to get to other places?

New Orleans being the inspiration for my login name has a certain place in my heart but that is a typical list designed to attract debate and publicity. Wellington NZ is the only remotely interesting city on that list and thats because its a gateway to other places. As posted above (binners as usual 🙂 ) Birmingham is awaful as are Rough Guides, there is. Reason Lonley Planet outsells them by some margin

@nickdavies - so the main selling point for Birmingham is you can get to other places easily 😉 (I see monro beat me to that observation)

Brum is a great place to live if you don't want to be there!

I think NickDavies beat you both to it... 😉