Birmingham Canal system

- Westside district, ICC, Central Square, Brindleyplace, Three Brindleyplace Clock Tower, BT Tower, National Sealife Centre, National Indoor Arena, Gas St Basin

The Worcester and Birmingham Canal is a 47 km long canal that links Birmingham with Worcester. It starts near River Severn in Worcester and ends in the Gas Street Basin in Birmingham. It is 29 miles (47 km) long. There is one branch that goes to the Northwest (towards Wolverhampton), one to the Southwest (towards Worcester) and one to the East inside Birmingham.

There are 58 locks in the canal (incl. one of the largest in Europe), and it climbs 130m from Worcester to Birmingham. The canal passes the West part of Birmingham's city centre and to the East of the Jewellery Quarter.

In the Westside district, you find the Brindleyplace, canalside mixed-use development. Here you find the National Sea Life Centre, Royal Bank of Scotland, Orion Media, Ikon Gallery of Art and the Crescent Theatre. Central Square, the heart of Brindleyplace, is a nice modern square/designed piazza with fountains and many postmodern buildings. The ArtsFest is held here annually. Here you find the Brindleyplace Clock Tower, a red brick landmark, that is part of Three Brindleyplace building in Italian renaissance/postmodern style that also faces the canal. Inside the building is an atrium. Oozels Square is next to Central Square.

Along the canal you find many landmark buildings as The Mailbox (a red highrise building from 2000 with offices,a mall, and Birmingham's BBC Studios), The Cube (residential building from 2010 with sharp architecture), ICC (International Convention Centre with a large futuristic atrium that leads to Centenary Square, here you also find the Symphony Hall), the recently renovated Barclaycard Arena (formerly the National Indoor Arena), the National Sealife Centre (a large aquarium designed by Norman Foster, features a glass tunnel) and BT Tower from 1966 (the tallest structure in Birmingham, a 152m telecom tower). There are also lots of open air restaurants along the canal.

I walked along the canal, from the tourist parts near Brindleyplace with its large buildings, restaurants, stores, nice open bridges and locks,passed by locks through less touristy parts through dark narrow tunnels with dripping water (!) to BT Tower and the Snow Hill area. So if you are sensitive and want to walk along the whole canal, bring an umbrella!

Many different kind of boats passes along the canal; private boats, tourist boats, restaurant boats, fire boats.