Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands county of England. It is the most populous British city outside London with a population of 1,016,800 (2008) and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the United Kingdom's second most populous Urban area.  Birmingham's metropolitan area, which includes surrounding towns to which it is closely tied through commuting, is the United Kingdom's second most populous with a population of 3,683,000.


In 2007, Birmingham was ranked as the 55th-most livable city in the world and the second most livable in the UK, according to the Mercer Index of worldwide standards of living.[8] Birmingham was also one of the founding cities for the Eurocities group and is also sitting as chair. Birmingham has the second-largest city economy in the UK, and was ranked 72nd in the world in 2008.

Source: Wikipedia