Birmingham Canal Museum

[Jim Shead]

Birmingham is the centre of the canal system has more miles of canal than any other city and owes its masive expansion in the Industrial Revolution to its water bourne trade - so why dosn't it have a canal museum?

 

I think there should be a Birmingham Canal Museum and I have set up the following web page to make the argument for it, to collect views from a survey and to suggest ways that we could campaign for it.

 

http://www.jim-shead.com/waterways/gwpf.php?wpage=Birmingham%20Canal%20Museum

 

I think both Birmingham and the waterways would benefit from such a museum - do you agree or am I barking up the wrong tree?

[Tonka]

It has at Dudley

[Jim Shead]

The Black country Museum is neither in Birmingham nor is it a Canal Museum. It is an excellent museum but it does not set out to explain the growth of the waterways system or the history of Birmingham in relation to the canals.

[Albion]

The Black country Museum is neither in Birmingham nor is it a Canal Museum. It is an excellent museum but it does not set out to explain the growth of the waterways system or the history of Birmingham in relation to the canals.

What happened to the Birmingham Museum of Science and Industry building that used to be half way down the Farmers Bridge flight? That used to be an excellent museum (although not specifically canal related). Has the building been redeveloped or is it still sitting there after the museum closed down (it's ages since I have been down that flight)?

Roger

[Hugh]

What happened to the Birmingham Museum of Science and Industry building that used to be half way down the Farmers Bridge flight? That used to be an excellent museum (although not specifically canal related). Has the building been redeveloped or is it still sitting there after the museum closed down (it's ages since I have been down that flight)?

Roger

It's called the 'ThinkTank' and IMHO has been redesigned for kids rather than historians. It's out of town by the old Curzon Street station

 

Hugh

[Stilllearning]

Having, in the past, been a volunteer at the London Canal Museum , I strongly agree with Jim Shead about this idea. In London it is a wonderful resource and venue, and a similar venture in Birmingham is a great idea.

[OldGoat]

It's called the 'ThinkTank' and IMHO has been redesigned for kids rather than historians. It's out of town by the old Curzon Street station

 

Hugh

 

Should benefit from HS2 then....

[OldGoat]

 

 

I think both Birmingham and the waterways would benefit from such a museum - do you agree or am I barking up the wrong tree?

 

I agree with BOTH of the above. Up the wrong tree because it could never pay for itself and I can't see money being available in these hard times without some form of tangible payback.

 

Your suggestive sighting also has some challenges because that area is a prime location so nobody's going to forgo rental income for a museum. There are - I'm sure many brown field sites along the line of the canals, but they are well away from the centre, so won't attract visitors in great numbers.

 

Like many cities / large towns Brum has a number of excellent museums, but publicity is poor at best and I think the all struggle.

How many here have visited:-

The pen museum

Back to backs

Soho house

The Jewellery musuem

the transport museum (now closed?)

 

Sorry, not trying to be negative, but there's a lot of legwork to be done.

[Derek R.]

Sadly Old Goat is right. But what a place Gas St. basin could have been with a museum in the old warehouse recreating all that had taken place in the past with clubhouse and restaurant facilities within like Blists Hill, Beamish or the BCM.

 

Dreaming again.

[pete harrison]

Sadly Old Goat is right. But what a place Gas St. basin could have been with a museum in the old warehouse recreating all that had taken place in the past with clubhouse and restaurant facilities within like Blists Hill, Beamish or the BCM.

 

Dreaming again.

I remember when Gas Street Basin was full of interesting and diverse floating exhibits, from B.C.N. day boats to former 'Grand Unions', 'Joshers' and 'Admirals' and all within an urban industrial setting. None of these boats required charitable or government funding and they were presented in all sorts of historic liveries, with enthusiastic owners who were happy to talk about them (I was one of them). This was only 30 years ago, but in my opinion has been ruined by progress and will never be reproduced.

[greywolf]

not visited the pen museum no real interest in it. back to back houses no soho house yes transport museum never really new where that was and i have visited the jewellery museum kind of ok. Museum and art gallery yes,Blacksley hall yes ditto saholm mill and Aston hall it could work depending on priceing. The old science museum i have been to but the new one was charging a shed load of money for nothing of interest to me and i had heard that a lot of the exhibits were broken .

[hecla777]

.....and of course we had a canal museum in Walsall at one time! Local authorities struggle with these things now and musuems are often low on their priorities for funding.

 

Martin O'Keeffe

[AMModels]

.....and of course we had a canal museum in Walsall at one time! Local authorities struggle with these things now and musuems are often low on their priorities for funding.

 

Martin O'Keeffe

 

Great little museum, still have a few exhibits belonging to my family which have disappeared since it closed. Not a great advert for anyone thinking of lending things to a museum.

[Laurence Hogg]

Jim,

It ought to have something, good idea. Within the walls of the art gallery there are a large number of painted pieces of ware, within the Library is a vast collection of documents including the Fellows Morton & Clayton archives. They own a Josher motor which is Peacock currently at the BCLM. But where would they have it? The City would rather sell for development than do something for the heritage, Icknield Port springs to mind but get CRT involved and we will all be very old men or in the ground before anything happens.

[RLWP]

Monument Lane basin

 

Richard

[Laurence Hogg]

Monument Lane basin

 

Richard

 

Railtrack owned, no proper access, pity its near the centre too!

[pearley]

If you are talking of a small exhibition space then the BW/CRT offices at Cambrian Wharf have a large room on one side which, on the last time I went in, was dedicated to posters, etc. Would be OK for a small display, you would only have to get CRT to open the building during normal hours.

 

Regards

Pete

[IanM]

Monument Lane basin

 

Richard

 

 

 

Railtrack owned, no proper access, pity its near the centre too!

 

Is that the one just up the main line on the right hand side?

[Jim Shead]

Birmingham has many museums scattered throughout the city that it thinks worthwhile maintaining so why not one that is so relevant to the history of Birmingham? On the question of the cost of a site I would point out that not all the banks are filled with high prestige buldings, a walk from Gas Street Basin to the Mailbox will take you past several buildings that look neglected and ripe for development. CRT also have canal side properties and they are in business to promote the canals.

[OldGoat]

Birmingham has many museums scattered throughout the city that it thinks worthwhile maintaining so why not one that is so relevant to the history of Birmingham? On the question of the cost of a site I would point out that not all the banks are filled with high prestige buldings, a walk from Gas Street Basin to the Mailbox will take you past several buildings that look neglected and ripe for development. CRT also have canal side properties and they are in business to promote the canals.

If you were to include the pub - now closed - on the far side of the basin, then you'd have a good starting point. Moorings outside and a good floor area, so the facilities are right.

Get CaRT to move from their posh offices by the NIA and you could have some synergy.

 

But again it's the cost > funding.

 

Bang away at it for some time and you might get results.

 

To my mind there's a lot to be said for a shared project - there's space at the BCM that's shouting for good use, by the forge and rolling mill that is dead whenever we visit.

 

BUT it's not Brum - but does that really matter. The development of the canals was all along that strip and the heavier industry was towards to 'Hampton (I'm guessing there as I'm a furriner from darn sarf).

 

What would help in the short term is for the City council (and in the wider sense) for all councils to make a better shot of publicising their museums. On these for a there are many enquiries - especially from overseas visitors - for places to visit. It's shocking that there's nowhere on the web where folks can get an overall picture. There used to be a government site pulled its funding got pulled years ago. Daft when the UK pushes it's heritage for visitors, but then makes it difficult to find what / where.

 

Anyone agree??

[Heartland]

Terry Foggarty has suggested a location if his transverse lock does replace the 6 locks at Camp Hill, it will make space for new rail links, roads and a potential canal museum at Camp Hill.

 

In this time of cut backs would a canal museum receive enough funding to survive. Look at the fate of the Birchills Canal Museum and that at Brasshouse Lane Smethwick. If boats went there would they be scrapped if not looked after?

 

Ray Shill

[John Williamson 1955]

It's been mantioned that the Black Country Museum isn't a canal museum, but when it opened, it had nothing to do with the motor industry either. Last time I visited, they had a gallery devoted to it. They also had a fair sized piece of currently unused land. There are already a few narrowboats on site, too, which aren't connected to the Dudley Canal Trust. If they could get funding, it could even be possible to move an old warehouse to some vacant space they have (had? I've not been for a year or three.) next to the canal basin.

 

There is also some empty land next to the Birmingham canal not too far away. It could all form the core of a similar arrangement to the one at Ironbridge, where a number of physically close museums have formed a marketing organisation to their mutual benefit.

 

Land and buildings near the centre of Birmingham would be too expensive, in my opinion, and parking in the area is already restricted, so tourists probably won't make a special trip. If the museums are close together on the outskirts with good parking, on the other hand....

 

Bye!

 

John

[Joseph]

Just to add my feelings on this.

 

Jim, great idea to have a museum of Birmingham canals in principle. Practical concerns....money to set up and run....stressful even to think about it.

 

But, as John W suggests, maybe an enlarged function at the BCLM? Especially if it was to focus on the BCN rather than on the waterways in general - Ellesmere Port covers this.

 

I'm all for that.

 

Joseph

[Jim Shead]

I am in favour of museums that cover canal history throughout the country but the point is that Birmingham, at the centre of the waterways system has nothing. I went to the recent History of Birmingham exhibition at the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery but I saw nothing on canals. When I took this up with the curators they said there was a canal share certificate on display. When I suggested they should have some canal exhibits they said they did not have space for them.

 

I do not accept that the Birmingham Canal Museum would be impossible to fund. If CRT can raise funds from outside bodies to produce "poetical lock gates" and the "floating forest" I am sure that funding could be found from multiple sources if the project had the necessary backing from the community. One thing that is certain is that if we start by concluding it is impossible then it will never happen.

[Pluto]

You only have to look at our existing museums to see that they are already run on a shoestring. Adding another will only impinge on existing funding, spreading it even more thinly. After over forty years of working in the museum and industrial history area as both professional and amateur, I would suggest that there is currently no room for more museums. If you want something to commemorate local canals, come up with an idea more in keeping with modern sources of finance. You are unlikely to get anything for a 'Museum'.