Successful start to the year for the Black Country and Telford branch

The Black Country and Telford branch of the Forum for the Built Environment (FBE) has had a busy start to 2011 with a successful and well attended regeneration meeting at Walsall College. Guest speakers at this meeting included Peter Roberts - assistant principal of Walsall College, Richard Reid - director of Amillan Ltd, Steven Davis - environmental manager of Skanska Walsall Manor Hospital and Michael Tichford- assistant director regeneration and housing, Walsall Council. All of the speakers spoke about the key regeneration projects in the region, including the college itself a recently completed £65m development. Amillan explored the relationship between technology and the built environment. Steven Davis talked about the £175m PFI project that Skanska were delivering at Walsall Manor hospital and Michael Tichford spoke of the need for the local authority to work in partnership with the private sector to develop new opportunities for regeneration. Phil Beale (fbe branch chairman) highlighted the potential relevance of this meeting in the context of continuing capital investment commitments in Walsall town centre regeneration against a back drop of a very difficult economic environment. "Recessionary effects and consequences of the local government response to last years emergency budget mean that everyone involved in the local economy if facing very tough challenges - forums such as FBE networking breakfast provide a unique opportunity to bring together people from all sides of the economy with a common goal, we expect new private and public sector project relationships to result from this event," he said. The branch only formed last year and began with a winning formula from the outset with meetings held in key area locations with significant guest speakers at each. Each meeting focuses on regional issues with guest speakers sharing their experiences of developing and delivering key regeneration projects. Links with local education establishments are also being developed, with careers and placement representatives from both the University of Wolverhampton and Walsall College being present at the Walsall meeting. 2010 meetings covered Telford, Wolverhampton and Dudley. The Dudley meeting, which was held at Dudley Zoo was significant in that details of two highly important capital investment programmes for the region were unveiled. Steve Johnson - director of estates and capital projects at Dudley College, outlined their plans to invest over £30 million into Dudley town centre to create a new learning quarter and Bill Kirk - chief executive of New Heritage Regeneration Limited, share plans for more than 20 projects that will give the public realm in Dudley a facelift and support and encourage further investment and regeneration. The Black Country & Telford branch has an exciting programme for the rest of 2011 with regional breakfast meetings in Stourbridge, Wolverhampton, Telford and Dudley. A mid summer garden party will be held in June and this event will raise funds for the branches adopted charity CRASH, a construction based charity that provides homes for homeless people.