Economic Change - Birmingham

• 1700 - population was 15,000 and machines for processing cotton produced in 1730s
• 1761 - Matthew Boulton built first ever factory 'Soho Manufactory' with 700 workers
• 19th Century - gun, jewellery, button and brass industries dominated, lots of migration in search of jobs
• In middle of canal network, Midland terminus of London to Birmingham railway opened in 1838
• Cadbury family set up Bournville factory and model village for workers in 1895
• Banks and insurance companies such as Lloyds set up
• Austin car plant opened at Longbridge in 1906
• Dunlop Tyre Factory opened in 1917 and employed 10,000 by the 1950s
• 60% had skilled jobs such as lathe operator and precision engineer
• Continuous population growth from natural increase and immigration from rural areas and Ireland
• Large areas of terraced housing built for workers with limited personal mobility in Aston
• Middle class developed who could afford to commute and helped drive urban expansion
• Survived Great Depression and interwar years due to metal industries
• Trams and railways, and later buses and cars, caused an outward growth of the built area
• Canals and rivers had pollution from industry, controls of emissions non-existent
• Unemployment in 1950s and 60s less then 1%, in 1982 was 19.4%
• Inequalities due to deindustrialisation widened gap between middle (Edgbaston) and working class
• 1.1 million population now, 7th most deprived local authority
• National government invested in NEC and Birmingham International Airport
• New Street Station transformed in £700 million project, solidifies it as UK's second largest city