Nearly three quarters of town centre will be redeveloped by 2018
Up to 拢1bn could be spent on redeveloping a west Midlands town over the next decade.
The plans for West Bromwich include a new leisure centre as well as existing schemes such as a 拢200m Tesco shopping mall, and 拢80m college campus plus a new school, refurbishment of the shopping centre and a police station. A new magistrates court, improvements to public space and 拢100m of new housing are also proposed as well as a cultural area centred on the town鈥檚 library and town hall.
Bob Badham, Sandwell council鈥檚 cabinet member for regeneration, said he hoped plans were sufficiently far advanced to ride out the worst effects of the economic downturn. 鈥淚 would be a fool to say it won鈥檛 affect it in some way but we are in a strong position because we have these schemes in the pipeline,鈥� he said.
He hoped the scheme, which will eventually redevelop 70 per cent of the town centre, will give it a 鈥淓uropean鈥� feel. He said: 鈥淧eople can meet and eat and drink there. They don鈥檛 just have to go there to do shopping at Tesco but look at the other things on offer there too. Doing nothing was not an option because it was becoming a run-down 1960s shopping centre.鈥�
