Trinity Street

Oh, maybe it was this in 1985

IIRC, the argument for levelling things off was to make it look better! I happen to agree that the taller section did nicely break up the boring roof line, but hey what do I know when compared to the expertise within the city planning offices?

This is a fantasy redevelopment I did a few months ago. The useless Trinity Street is now a bus quarter. The current "ironmonger row" is corrected to Little Butcher Row and is pedestrianized along with reinstated Butcher Row and Cross Cheaping. More grass is added. A little spot where the end of Ironmonger Row was is named Ironmonger Corner and a little area is called Spicerstoke Square. Just a doodle, not claiming it a perfect design.

A photo of flapdoodle's invisible buses - a rare view of Trinity Street without a single bus in sight

When the council opened the new Trinity St before the war, for 2/3 weeks what did shoppers complain about?

I enjoy doodling little projects myself and playing around with the north-south axis through the city centre is one of my favourites. When I look at it, I always end up turning Trinity St into a pedestrianied boulevard for a few reasons. 1. It's literally feet away from a HUGE main bus terminus - why use another huge amount of space for buses to pick up/drop off in this area? 2. It's the most obvious route up towards the main shopping area and also provides access to the cathedral/historic quarter. It can therefore be assumed it will have quite heavy pedestrian traffic and therefore needs space to accommodate them. When I have to walk towards Pool Meadow I'm constantly having to avoid or banging other people because the footpaths aren't wide enough to accommodate those using the street and those waiting for buses. As well as this due to it being such a well used route and the large amount of footfall that brings a pedestrianised path would make it more viable for things like coffee shops, cafes and restaurants as well as conventional shops. 3. With a bit of imagination and forward planning it could be the start of a pedestrian route linking up some of the history. Trinity St would line up well with Greyfriars Lane if you chopped the nose off the front of Cathedral Lanes, and provide a route taking in all three spires. Granted Greyfriars Lane is an eyesore at the moment apart from the old hospital but with the surface level car park could be filled in with similar structures a la Spon Street and a long term plan put in place to add frontages to the rest of the street. I think the area between High St and New Union St could be utilised as a sort of living museum. Really long term I could envisage a pedestrian route/history trail from the train station up Manor House Drive and Greyfriars Lane but that's another story and unfortunately all the plans seem to be trying to go in completely the opposite way (such as Friargate and the water park)

My idea was to get the buses from Cross Cheaping/Burges to pedestrianise it. I don't like the idea of Trinity Street merged and blended in with the Butcher Row area, I don't think it deserves it as the original Trinity Street project caused so much destruction to create it. For a purely pedestrian route from the bus station I'd right another wrong and open up New Buildings again.

Osmiroid, my memory tells me that when Trinity Street was first opened, although the trams passed down it, it was a very wide pavement for those days, and I don't think there was a tram stop between Broadgate and the fire station, neither could you park, so it was a street of new shops with plenty of room for shoppers (pedestrians only). The shops down the Burges were smaller and not so many customers. I also seem to think that Hales Street had no tram lines, so less traffic for people to get to Pool Meadow. (6 months ago I visited Coventry and I thought the modern bus station did no better than the old Pool Meadow and looked just as tatty). No one in those days was thinking of 100 years ahead, they knew that future councils would alter things. Yes Coventry lost more than Butcher Row, it lost a good part of Coventry atmosphere, it also lost its tranquility, peacefulness and friendliness (shop staff etc) but that's the world over today. It also lost a lot of rats, filth etc that people don't want to talk about. 1930's saw big changes in the way we live, inside bathrooms, toilets, hot water. I have no figures but the population since the 1930's must be enormous and so must the thinking be on a larger scale.

What I would have liked to see them do was, between the Burges, Hales St, Trinity St, to have created the old Coventry, little old cobbled lanes, with Butcher Row shop facades and markets and stalls in the way Coventry once was. Maybe the Burges down to one lane, out.

It would be good if someone built in a field somewhere a re-creation, like a Hollywood film set, of the city centre pre-1936 destruction so people could experience it as near as possible. Although when it comes to Butcher Row the ground layout is now cleared so a functioning replica with real shops could actually be built from Spicerstoke to New Buildings (apart from the Flying Standard area). And there is cleared ground more than the space needed to rebuild the Royal Vaults pub in its original spot. As for getting the current misnamed "Ironmonger Row" renamed back to Little Butcher Row, all it needs is a street sign and it's sorted. Come on Council!!!!

I wasn't sure, but the incoming one from Bell Green, did that run straight to Broadgate? But to answer my own post on 44 the street had a wide pavement with a smooth surface, apart for a couple of spots, and boys used it for roller skating, to the annoyance of the shoppers, the police warned them off. If my memory is correct. At the time I think people welcomed the new street.

Kaga, yes, I've seen the pictures of the opening day of Trinity Street and the massive crowd. It's just ended up as a deadzone that people mostly use to pass through though.

I considered that myself, but it just didn't make as much sense if we are to assume that the majority of the foot traffic from this direction will heading from the bus station into the retail core or vice versa. To pedestrianise Burges and make it the pedestrian route, at some point pedestrians from the Bus Station will have to cross a road and therefore buses going into Trinity St. It kind of defies the point of pedestrianisation. Do it the other way round, and send buses up the Burges, and the paths of pedestrians and buses need never cross. The newer vehicle entrance to Pool Meadow next to the Old Fire Station means a lot of the buses don't really have to go round to the Priory St entrance anymore or could be routed to enter via Cox St direction and leave the space outside the Old Grammar School, Motor Museum and Pool Meadow totally vehicle free. Plus as I said you're not using an area right next to a huge bus station for buses. Personally I think Trinity St largely became a 'walk-through' because all the people waiting for buses made it very difficult to use as a shopping street - you couldn't stop and look in a window because it would hold everybody up. But it is one of the busier routes in terms of people. It just needs to be made user friendly. I may be wrong, but it seems that part of your thinking is that you don't want to mix 'old' Coventry and the newer 20th century onwards routes. I'm not bothered about this and am more than happy to mix the two. Personally I think Trinity Street makes a coherent and legible route. As for New Buildings, the Millennium Project was aimed at doing that. Sadly, it hasn't worked. Not necessarily because the route itself is that bad, but the planners didn't add enough frontages or make the route legible enough for people to use it. It could definitely add to the mix, but I've always looked on it as an 'as well as' rather than 'instead of'.

Yes, I'd like to rebuild The Golden Lion near New Buildings entrance to block Trinity Street to/from traffic, and have walkways either side to get from Butcher Row into whatever would be of Trinity Street. Some of the old stuff can now be recreated and be a useful and functioning part of the city centre. (Who'd have though 80 years after the council destroyed Butcher Row we'd have the ground layout approximately back).

Hi all, Just seen this on Facebook. I would love a Wimpy bender. If only.