Birmingham Special: Back in the premier league

Massive rejuvenation has made Birmingham a city to do locals and visitors proud. Simon Calder can scarcely recognise the place

Two things are not quite right about Metro, the swift new tram that swishes into Birmingham from Wolverhampton. First, the logo looks like a snail, whereas the tram lives up to its slogan of fast, frequent and friendly. More annoying is the voice used for the recorded announcements: it's a BBC voice, but the wrong one.

A posh, Radio 4 soundalike has been hired by Centro, which runs the service, to tell people that the next stop is Black Lake or the Jewellery Quarter. The West Midlands transport authority should have shown more civic pride and signed up one of the Beeb's Brummies – pick an Adrian, either Chiles (Radio Five Live) or Goldberg (Watchdog). That said, the new link is a beauty. Over the years, I have arrived in Birmingham from many different directions by road and rail, but never in such style. The 35-minute theme park ride – where the theme is urban resuscitation – whisks you through Wednesbury, West Bromwich and Winson Green on a combination of former railways, existing roads and new cuttings. It is a perfect example of harnessing the past to provide for the future, a concept that is blossoming in Birmingham.

Every eight minutes a tram darts through parklands, across canals and traverses a certain amount of dereliction. The arrival in England's second city is little short of magnificent, especially when compared with the bleakness of New Street. The terminus at Snow Hill station has been brought back from oblivion to become the most accessible hub in the city. I emerge straight on to Colmore Row, a few steps from the lovely, modest city cathedral decorated with Burne-Jones stained glass.

Any community bidding to become European Capital of Culture needs to make the stranger feel immediately welcome. For the second half of the 20th century, Birmingham appeared to want to conceal the natural warmth of the citizens and curtail civic pride in the city. The centre was involved in a terrible road accident – the construction of the most dehumanising road network of any British city centre. Birmingham was signed away – lock, stock and Bull Ring – to the motor car. No wonder the visitors left town – assuming they could find an exit from the ring road. That was before the civic surgeons got to work, ruthlessly amending the cityscape – but this time to reclaim Birmingham for the people.

After drifting down Colmore Row into the agreeably lopsided Victoria Square, where people meet street art and each other, I breeze across Chamberlain Square. Just past the opulent Museum and Art Gallery, where I would normally expect to be directed into some subterranean concrete labyrinth designed by Escher in collaboration with Kafka, the crowd is sweeping on. A new pathway leads directly over Paradise Circus (named in the Sixties by someone with a strong sense of irony), bound for the wide open space named Centenary Square. Here, the scurry suddenly dissipates, as though a heavenly "shhh" has quietened the city. Relics of 19th-century municipal pride – now reclaimed by Birmingham – are scattered around, together with a frozen platoon of citizens, striding purposefully towards the future. Or maybe they are heading beyond the Symphony Hall and the International Convention Centre towards Pizza Express or the Ikon Gallery at Brindleyplace.

The latter earned the first recognition of Birmingham's recuperation. In 1998, the city-centre waterfront won the UK prize in British Airways' Tourism for Tomorrow awards. The name of the 18th-century engineer who placed Birmingham at the hub of England's canal system was borrowed for the development (he was actually called James Brindley – the "place" suffix was a fancy Nineties addition). His work was amplified in the early 19th century by Thomas Telford, whose cast-iron footbridges still make an imprint amid the rejuvenation.

As every great city has recognised, water is vital for flourishing urban life. Canals add light and space to Birmingham, moderating the architectural grief in which much of the city centre wallowed. The area south of here used to be a prime offender, a patch of land beyond the ring road that humanity forgot. The sorting office that was formerly the only place where a business pulse could be detected closed down. But the place is now sorted. A canalside walk now leads down from Brindleyplace to The Mailbox. A shoebox, rather than a mailbox, has been amplified about a billion times and enhanced by a grand entrance, dramatic spaces and one of James Brindley's celebrated water features. Plenty of upmarket stores have been attracted there, but the main attraction are the bars, cafés and restaurants strung out along the canal, aiming to transport the customer from Santa Fe to Sapporo. There's another option, too: the New Main Line to Wolverhampton. This is no supertram, but a 180-year-old Thomas Telford canal alongside which now runs a section of the National Cycle Network.

The improvement has been dazzling – a word that readily offers itself on a bright May afternoon when the sun splashes from a canal or fountain, or ricochets from an ambitious new structure like The Mailbox. Keeping a safe distance as I thread my way through the void formerly known as the Bull Ring, I watch a team meticulously taking apart an old flyover. Destruction is rarely a pretty sight, but in this city unravelling the mistakes of the past is a spectator sport.

The Bull Ring is dead. Long live Birmingham – like its newly promoted football team, back in the premier league.

The Birmingham Convention Bureau has four visitors' centres: Victoria Square (130 Colmore Row, 0121 693 6300), 2 City Arcade (0121 643 2514); the International Convention Centre (0121 665 6116); and the National Exhibition Centre (0121 780 4321). Or visit www.birmingham.org.uk