Birmingham ranks high in fame, low in popularity, YouGov report finds
A recent YouGov report reveals that Birmingham ranks high in fame but lower in popularity. We took to the streets here in the city centre to hear from the public on why they think the city is recognised by many but doesn't seem to be winning over as many hearts.
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00:00Right, well I hope I sound like a Brummie, but I'm actually from Yorkshire originally,
00:04so I came here to go to college and I absolutely love the place. It's brilliant. I think people
00:11are just snobby frankly, and a lot of the people that are rude about it have just never
00:15been here. It's a brilliant, modern, European, international city. I always think it's a
00:23bit like the United States. Hardly anybody here can go back more than, I don't know,
00:28maybe three generations. I'm in my 60s now, a lot of my mates have Irish heritage, but
00:33then you move forward a bit more and there's a lot of people from the Indian subcontinent.
00:38You walk around, you hear so many different languages. You don't need to go abroad, you
00:42can just hang out around here. I moved here in 2000, and when I moved here from London,
00:51people were saying, why on earth are you moving to London? When I turned up in Birm... Why
00:56are you moving to Birmingham? When I turned up in Birmingham, people said, why on earth
00:59have you moved here? So, you know, you go to Manchester and people there big up the
01:06city like no one's business. You go to Birmingham and it's really difficult to get people to
01:11be enthusiastic about the place. Well, we're not from Birmingham, but we've come for the
01:15day because I've been before, and I think Birmingham is a beautiful city. Now, the reputation
01:21it could be because years ago it wasn't so beautiful, it wasn't so clean, and it wasn't
01:27so airy and spacious. So maybe people are still living in the past, whereas I think
01:33it's a beautiful city. Well, the thing is, many people come to look at Birmingham, they
01:39can't believe how bad it's going. They thought it was going to be fantastic, the nightclubs,
01:42this and that. And when they come round, they told me the other day when I was here, there's
01:46nowhere to go. I said, no, that's what's happening. I said, but then if you go into our market
01:49centre, where it used to be famous for, the market, and now it's gone so down, so low,
01:55people think, God, what's the point of coming to Birmingham these days?