BID Response to MRHA

About Digbeth BID

Digbeth BID came into existence following a successful ballot of local businesses in summer 2026. It represents the interests of over 400 organisations across an extensive area of the district, spanning creative and cultural enterprise, independent hospitality and the night-time economy, workspace and studios, heavy industry and warehousing, retail, education and the charitable sector.

Our five-year plan is built around three pillars: Ambition, Better Basics, and Community and Culture. We reinvest our members’ levy funds locally and act as a collective voice for the business community. It is in that capacity that we respond.

Digbeth is Birmingham’s most distinctive and fast-evolving district: creative, independent and proudly inclusive. It has drawn national recognition, including from The Sunday Times and Time Out, and continues to attract major investment and occupiers. It is a place where people create, produce and belong, and its character is precisely what makes it economically valuable to the city.

Our Position in Principle

Digbeth BID supports investment in the region's rail network and recognises the long-term connectivity, capacity and economic benefits that the Midlands Rail Hub is intended to deliver. Our response is not an objection in principle. It is a call for the scheme to be designed and delivered in a way that does not undermine the existing business community it passes through, and for that community to be treated as a core stakeholder rather than a residual impact to be managed. The Alliance describes the current material as early proposals and states that the indicative land requirements may change as the proposals develop.

Digbeth BID therefore does not treat the current alignment, footprint, land take, compounds, construction method or phasing as fixed or exhaustive, and may supplement this response when further information becomes available.

Our two priority asks are set out in full below, but we highlight them at the outset: first, begin an independent economic and business disruption impact assessment now and publish it before the 2027 consultation; and second, publish the options and viability analysis before that consultation. These are urgent because uncertainty itself may delay leases, fit-outs, equipment investment, recruitment, expansion and inward investment. If businesses cannot plan with confidence, employment and productivity may stall, with knock-on effects for suppliers and the wider economy. That would cut across the scheme's own stated objectives of supporting jobs, business productivity, regeneration and economic growth.

The Cumulative Burden on Digbeth, and the Lessons of the Metro

Digbeth has already absorbed sustained disruption from two major infrastructure programmes: HS2 construction and the Birmingham Eastside Metro Extension. While both carry long-term benefits and are

broadly supported by our community, local businesses have reported real and immediate effects on footfall and trading viability, and some businesses closed during the period.

The Eastside Metro Extension is the most instructive precedent, and the BID was formed in the context of the issues it exposed. Local businesses reported that there was no consolidated business voice to engage

with before key decisions were made, so businesses often learned of works too late to influence them or prepare. They also reported that business support was difficult to understand, did not always reflect

profitability or the circumstances of smaller traders, and that wayfinding, public communication and taxi and private-hire access were significant problems. We set out these lessons not to apportion blame, but because they are avoidable, and because this scheme has the opportunity to avoid them from the outset.

The scheme now proposed would be the third major infrastructure programme to run through the same area. On the Alliance's current indicative timeline, consultation runs through 2026 and 2027, a Transport and Works Act Order application is shown for 2028, construction begins in 2030 and the works open in the early 2030s. For businesses on the ground this means years of uncertainty followed by the prospect of significant construction disruption in a district that has already shouldered sustained pressure. This cumulative context must be central to how impacts are assessed and mitigated, not treated as

background.

The Emerging Planning Policy Context

Digbeth is identified as a Growth Zone under draft Policy GZ10 (formerly GZ12 in earlier drafts) in Birmingham City Council's Regulation 18 Focused Preferred Options for the emerging Birmingham Local Plan. That consultation has closed and the Council is preparing the publication plan. The new Local Plan is not yet adopted. The draft policy sets out a vision for the area that includes accommodating substantial growth while protecting Digbeth's creative, cultural and night-time economy clusters.

This matters for the present scheme in two respects. First, the draft policy and related regeneration material identify viaduct-based public-realm aspirations, including the Bordesley Viaduct Low Line and the Duddeston Viaduct SkyPark. Second, the emerging planning material recognises that the Midlands Rail Hub works and Digbeth's regeneration plans need to be reconciled. The scheme should therefore be developed in a way that is consistent with, and does not unnecessarily foreclose, the city's emerging planning direction while the railway proposals remain capable of refinement.

The Scheme’s Direct Impact on our Members

The consultation material makes clear that this scheme reaches well beyond the operational railway. The widening of the northern deck of the Bordesley viaduct between Park Street and Upper Trinity Street, the construction of the East and West Chords, and the associated works require permanent and temporary land acquisition, supported by compulsory purchase powers under the Transport and Works Act Order. The land acquisition plan expressly identifies temporary worksites and access that “may require building demolition.”

Using our own boundary and rateable value data, we have carried out a preliminary street-level screening of nine streets that intersect or adjoin the indicative scheme, worksites, access arrangements or proposed road changes: Gibb Street, Heath Mill Lane, Adderley Street, Bordesley Street, Warwick Street, Upper Trinity Street, Coventry Road, Park Street and Lower Trinity Street. This is a street-name exposure screen, not a property-by-property GIS match to the scheme boundary. On that basis:

1. 251 separately rated hereditaments are recorded on those nine streets, with a combined rateable value of approximately £5.368 million - around 21% of the total rateable value in the BID model. This does not mean 251 separate businesses or buildings will be acquired or demolished.
2. 2. The indicative scheme footprint runs directly through the creative workspace clusters around Gibb Street and the Custard Factory, the independent hospitality and night-time economy venues, and the workshops, studios and warehousing that give Digbeth its identity and its employment base.
3. 3. The Environment Report accompanying this consultation identifies public houses and music venues among the sensitive receptors within 200 metres of the scheme boundary, and states that potential construction and operational changes in noise and vibration will be assessed. These are not incidental land uses in Digbeth. They are the businesses our members run.

We raise these figures not to overstate the position: not every hereditament on these streets faces acquisition or demolition. They make clear that the scheme intersects with a large and economically significant part of the district's business base, and that the threshold for meaningful assessment, mitigation and support is correspondingly high. We ask the Alliance to provide usable property-level mapping so this preliminary screening can be refined.

We have Two Priority Asks:

Our Further Asks

The Strength of Public Feeling

Digbeth is not only a business district; it is one of the places Birmingham most identifies with, and the proposals have already generated significant local concern and public interest. This depth of feeling reflects how much is at stake, and how closely this scheme and its handling will be watched. Digbeth BID is well placed to represent and channel that voice constructively. We would far rather do so in partnership with the Alliance, as an organised and representative stakeholder, than see a community left to react to decisions after they are made. We say this as a statement of the scale of interest, and of our willingness to work with you to get this right.

Conclusion

Digbeth BID welcomes investment in Birmingham's rail network and wants the Midlands Rail Hub to succeed. But the success of this scheme cannot come at the cost of the business community that already makes Digbeth one of the most distinctive places in the country. Above all, we ask that you: (1) begin and publish an independent economic and business disruption impact assessment before the 2027 consultation; and (2) publish the options and viability analysis before that consultation. Alongside that, we ask the Alliance to engage with us directly and early, keep the early proposals genuinely open to refinement, maintain safe access, and put in place fair support for all affected occupiers, including under-tenants and licensees.

We would welcome a meeting with the Alliance to discuss this response and to establish a constructive working relationship for the stages ahead.

Yours Faithfully,

Emma Riley

Chair, Digbeth Business Improvement District

For and on behalf of the Board

Supported and undersigned by the following members of the Digbeth BID Board: