The Beginnings of the School of Planning
Wednesday, June 6th, 2007
The school first started above a car showroom in Broad Street – as I recall it was a P. J Evans showroom selling Austin cars. The showroom was situated on the north side and fronted both onto Broad St. and an open “square”, actually a parking area in front of Bush House – a six or eight story post-war building occupied by the Council and in later years occupied in particular by the City Housing Department. The Evans building was a corner building which formed one side of this “square”. All of this has of course been cleared away for the development of Brindley Place.
Walter Stranz was the head of School from 1983-1984, the following article, by David Hall, is reproduced by kind permission of 
When Leslie Ginsburg first came to Birmingham, the city’s reconstruction after its wartime bomb damage had hardly begun. The city had received as many tons of bombs as had Merseyside; the two were equal second as worst-bombed places after London. Unlike many other – bombed and unbombed – cities, a deliberate decision has been taken by Herbert Manzoni CBE (later Sir Herbert, the City Surveyor and Engineer) not to produce a major comprehensive plan and certainly not to employ eminent and expensive consultants to do so.
