Natural England

The West Midlands region lies right at the heart of England and covers an area of over 13000km². It is the country’s manufacturing and agricultural heartland and lies at the hub of the national transport network. 80% of the region is rural yet the area is dominated by the Birmingham conurbation. Over 5 million people live here but only 20% in our rural areas.

Although the Birmingham conurbation dominates the region it includes the county towns of Hereford, Worcester, Stafford, Warwick and Shrewsbury. It also has the economic centres of Wolverhampton, Telford and Stoke on Trent.

Natural England works with a range of partners across all areas – social economic and environmental – to improve the quality of our countryside and the quality of life for the people who live in the region. 

Environmental Context
The people of the West Midlands have shaped the region’s natural features to create a rich diversity of landscapes, unique in character both physically and culturally.

Like most of the English countryside, the region’s diversity has been subject to a number of forces which impact on landscape character, biodiversity and natural resources. The human impact in the form of intensive agriculture, congested roads, contaminated water resources, new housing and commercial development, along with the impact of the West Midlands’s long industrial tradition is placing increased strain on the rural areas of the region. 

Emphasising the West Midlands region’s rural areas are the facts that 80% of the region is rural and over a fifth of the total area of the West Midlands is classified as green belt land. 

The river corridors of the Severn, Wye, Trent and Avon are arguably the most significant natural features of the region and are important to wildlife, recreation and agriculture. The West Midlands also has a number of distinct nationally and locally important assets. These includes remnant heathlands, veteran trees and forest wood pasture, grazing marshes, open moorland landscape with traditional agricultural features including field barns and stone walls and historic landscaped parks. 

Recreational use of the West Midlands countryside has increased considerably and the expenditure generated by trips to these areas and also rural tourism has contributed significantly to the income of rural businesses and local employment.      

Rural recreation and tourism activities are clearly dependent on a high quality environment and the West Midlands region has much to offer. There are several areas of high-quality countryside, many of which are easily accessible by the region’s extensive public rights of way network. Our finest countryside ranges from the southern edge of the Peak District National Park to four Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Statutorily protected wildlife sites account for an important but relatively small part of the habitat resource, covering only around 1% of the region’s area.