COVENTRY MESSAGE BOARD

Coventry has been chosen to be the UK's City of Culture for 2021



The title is awarded every four years and it means the city will host a year-long celebration of arts and performance.

It will hope to emulate the success of Hull, which is UK City of Culture this year. The title is estimated to have boosted Hull's economy by £60m.

The other places in the running for the title were Swansea, Paisley, Stoke-on-Trent and Sunderland.

Coventry in line for a £1BILLION windfall



Coventry could benefit from a windfall in excess of a billion pounds after winning the race to become UK City of Culture.

That is the estimated economic uplift to the city by the man who led Coventry’s bid to land the coveted accolade in 2021.

David Burbidge, who heads-up the Coventry City of Culture Trust, revealed the revised figure in March this year.

Mr Burbidge said then that the economic benefit to the city would be considerably more than was originally thought.

The revised estimate is also a conservative one, according to Mr Burbidge, who said it could be “even greater”.

The revised £1bn estimate is based on a meeting Mr Burbidge had with the people at the helm of the current UK City of Culture - Hull.

The Coventry City of Culture Trust initially estimated a successful bid would bring £80m of economic benefit to Coventry but that estimate was revised upwards.

Mr Burbidge said: “The projections for Hull are £1bn. Because Coventry is far better placed in the centre of the country, and sits at the heart of the transport network, the uplift here could be even greater and well above £1bn.

“Our initial £80m forecast was deliberately conservative, as Liverpool’s position as European City of Culture was worth about £800m to it.

“But I’m now far more confident of the real impact being far greater.”