Other places in "Now & Then"... Search this site:

Arts School, Ford Street Bishop Street Bishop Street Post Office Blue Coat School & Ruins Broadgate from Holy Trinity Church Broadgate Special Page Burges from Bishop Street Burges from Cross Cheaping Butcher Row, Great Butcher Row, Little Cheylesmore Manor House Coat of Arms Bridge Cook Street gate Council House Cox Street Far Gosford Street Fleet Street Ford's Hospital Golden Cross & Pepper Lane Greyfriars Lane The Grove Guildhall & 22 Bayley Lane Hales Street Herbert Art Gallery & Museum Hertford Street Hertford Street from Broadgate High Street from Broadgate High Street from Earl Street Hill Street, Bablake & Bond's Hippodrome, old Humber Motor Works Ironmonger Row Jordan Well & Earl Street Jordan Well & Gosford Street Kenilworth Road Mill Dam & Whittle Arch Much Park Street Naul's Mill Park Old Grammar School Old Rope Walk Palace Yard Pool Meadow Precinct & Old Coventry Aerial View Precinct, upper Precinct, west view Priory Row Priory Street, lower end Priory Street, upper end Queen Victoria Road Flood of 1900 Railway Station, Eaton Road Railway Station - the Platform Smithford Way Spon End Arches Spon Street Flood of 1900 St. John's Church, Fleet Street St. Michael's Avenue St. Michael's Ruins St. Michael's Spire from Pepper Lane Stoke Green & Pool Swanswell Gate Swanswell Pool Swimming Baths, Priory Street Trinity Church Trinity Lane & the Free Library Trinity Lane from Priory Row Trinity Street & Hales Street War Memorial Park Warwick Row to Hertford St & Warwick Lane Well Street from Hales Street West Orchard Wheatley Street Schools

The Upper Precinct. Camera No. 6

Not so far back in time now - just to 1955 as depicted by this postcard proudly showing off Coventry's newly completed Upper Precinct. It wasn't to everyone's taste though. I must admit to not being too keen myself on the "block" buildings and uninteresting straight lines everywhere, but at the time this "Festival of Britain" design with its safe pedestrian walkways won awards and was copied world-wide.

The view today is broadly similar but in the 1990's someone had a brain storm and decided that it would be a good idea to drop a huge glass canopy containing escalators into the middle of the precinct! Not exactly in keeping with the surroundings. Also, from ground level, part of the old spire is now obscured by the building of the Cathedral Lanes shopping centre in Broadgate, its tent-like canopy visible in the lower photograph beneath the tower of St. Michael's.
How did this compare to the original wartime plans for the precinct development? See the "Post-War Changes" section.

---

Precinct & Old Coventry Aerial View < - Upper Precinct - > Precinct, West View

Broadgate Special Page

---