If reports are true that Channel 4 might relocate to Birmingham, should it mark the start of a cultural and economic exodus from the capital? And how might the British Museum look in Liverpool?
Does Alan Carr know where the Bullring is? If not, he may soon learn: Channel 4, it was reported over the weekend, may soon be asked to pack up its bags and move to Birmingham. Partly, that’s for the £85m that the government could claw back from the sale of C4’s headquarters in the heart of Westminster. But there are bigger reasons: if Channel 4 were to leave London, the thinking goes, it could help stimulate the creative economy outside of the capital — and give another boost to Britain’s second-biggest city. As the Bullring is to shopping outside of the capital, so Carr and co may be to broadcast media.
If it does happen, it’ll be another piece of evidence that the movement to decentralise the British economy is gathering pace – and if it works, it may raise the question: just how much more impact could London’s biggest landmarks have if they dared to cut their ties to the capital? With endless talk of the “northern powerhouse”, the argument for a bit of cultural redistribution has never been stronger. Throw in the idea that the Houses of Parliament might be forced to relocate by the prohibitive costs of fixing the Palace of Westminster and you can begin to see a blueprint for a very different country. “A lot of decisions are driven by the image that investors form of a place,” says Dr Michael Leary-Owhin, co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Urban Regeneration. “If the Houses of Parliament were up north it would massively change the way they were viewed, or if a big museum were to relocate to somewhere not noted for art – it just pings on investors’ radar.”
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