With its population set to reach 1,240,000 by 2030, Birmingham is also England’s fastest growing city. Housing and commercial and transport development needs are rapidly increasing: with much of the city and surrounding urban areas underdeveloped, Birmingham is set to be a hot spot of activity.

Birmingham’s flagship projects include The Curzon Street Masterplan which outlines proposals for 141 hectares of regeneration envisioned to bring 36,000 new jobs, 4,000 new homes and 600,000 square metres of commercial development. The Smithfield Market redevelopment will also create a brand new innovative and sustainable city quarter with jobs, amenities and over 3,000 much-needed new homes. This 17-hectare development will anchor an expanded city centre, helping to accelerate a wider transformation of Birmingham and supporting long-term economic and social prosperity.

As Birmingham rapidly expands due to new developments like these and much-needed regeneration, the requirement for an open and transparent platform which can visualise and tell the story of this metropolitan giant’s reshaping is key. VU.CITY Birmingham is already meeting this by enabling all parties to see schemes in context – at a macro level and city-wide, to clearly understand where opportunities lie, such as for building densely. The implications of proposals for Birmingham can be readily and easily understood thanks to the platform’s data layers revealing a wealth of information about, for instance, locally- and statutory-listed buildings, tree preservation orders, and consented schemes.

Users of VU.CITY Birmingham include ADG, Sandwell Council, JLL, Iceni, Node and CityScape Digital who have already discovered the model’s many benefits, from being able to instantly understand and assess a site’s challenges and potential, to simplifying the planning application, or improving how everyone involved can collaborate in a simple, single platform.