As planners prepare to decide on the future of a proposed big wheel for York, Stephen Lewis takes a spin on the Birmingham Eye.

JUST turn left out of New Street station, head for the International Convention Centre and you won't be able to miss it, or so I was told.

It wasn't quite that simple. When I spilled out of Birmingham's main railway station, I found myself in an urban jungle.

A huge slab of modern glass and sandstone cutting off the view ahead turned out to be the back of the redeveloped Bull Ring. To my left was something that looked like a giant gherkin with windows, while the street disappeared into a canyon between tower blocks linked by what appeared to be a smaller version of the Tyne Bridge. And not a big wheel in sight.

I consulted my map and headed up between the high rises to pedestrianised New Street, Birming-ham's old shopping centre. There, as snowflakes began to drift down from a wintry sky, I turned left as instructed.

It was another ten minutes of brisk walking before I caught my first glimpse of the wheel. I emerged from a dank underpass and there it was - a tall, graceful arch stretching skywards with the bulk of the International Convention Centre looming behind.

In the context of Birmingham's high rise flats and offices, and with the generous expanse of Centenary Square stretching away towards the east, the wheel didn't look overwhelming at all. Despite its 177 foot height, it was topped by the gleaming blue tower of the Hyatt Regency hotel almost next door.

Whether it would fit so comfortably into the smaller-scale surroundings of York's Tower Gardens is another matter.

Close up, the sheer size of the thing was daunting. Sleek white spokes like the spars of some huge ship rose skywards to a central nose-cone. The gondolas, which from a distance appeared like tiny pearls on a giant necklace, were each the size of a minibus, with room in comfort for eight people.

I had been told the wheel opened at 11am. At 11.40, however, there was no sign of life. A couple of school kids were standing in the steady snow. But there were no queues, and the ticket office remained closed. I spotted a cleaner sporting a plastic bib with the words World Tourist Attractions emblazoned across it. Wasn't the wheel opening today?

"12 o'clock," he said.

By 12, a short queue of about eight people had formed. On cue, the ticket booth opened. A cheerful woman inside apologised for the delay. First day of a new contract, she said, and the opening times had changed.

We paid - it's £5 for adults, £4 for senior citizens, £3 for children aged 12 and under - and mounted the barricaded steps leading to the platform where passengers embark. From down here, the giant wheel resembled a chair lift, the row of stationary gondolas rising into the air ahead of me.

With so few people queuing, we had a gondola each. They were smart, clean and modern, decked out in contemporary white and dark blue. Slightly disappointingly - given what I had read about the similar wheel in Manchester - there wasn't a French commentary expounding on the delights of Paris once I got inside. Instead, a bright, slightly cheesy voice was busy telling me all about how great Birmingham was.

There was a slight jerk, and then - smoothly, soundlessly and surprisingly quickly - I found myself being swung high up into the air.

Through the windows of my gondola, I could see the arms of the great wheel revolving a little like the spokes of the space station in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. And the cityscape of Birmingham began to unfold before me.

To one side reared the gleaming, dark-blue tower of the Hyatt, the sky reflected in its glass. To the east stretched the formal patterns of Centenary Square, and beyond that the high-rise jumble of the Birmingham skyline. Somewhere in that jungle of concrete was the Bull Ring, but I wouldn't have known which it was.

Not the most breathtaking of views, exactly: but simply being so high, with only a cage of glass and steel between you and the drop, was exhilarating. The feeling of swift motion added to the thrill.

When my gondola reached the top, the wheel stopped. I swung there 177 feet above the ground, in silence. The car swayed a little in the wind as I crossed from side to side the get the benefit of the full 360 degree view. Then, as suddenly as the ride had begun, I was dipping down towards the ground again.

Three times I was swung up high above Birmingham, and three times I swooped back down again. Each full circuit lasted three or four minutes, making for a total ride of about ten minutes.

Afterwards, as my fellow passengers disembarked, I asked them what they had thought.

"I enjoyed it," said Ann Turner, who had come from Wolverhampton with her husband. "I thought it was going to be slow, but it wasn't. It was good."

And would they come to York to have a go if there was a wheel there?

"We don't need an excuse to come to York," said Gerry. "We come to Yorkshire quite often to stay in Coxwold." "But if there was a wheel there, we would go on it," Ann said.

John and Rachel O'Connell, who had travelled from Kidderminster to bring their daughter Katie to the wheel for her first birthday, were also enthusiastic.

It was very quick, John said: "But a very enjoyable experience. Katie stood staring out of the window all the way round, and it is something for her to remember her birthday by."

"Great fun," added a woman called Helen, down from Scotland with her friend Graham. "And I'm sure there are a lot of visitors who would go on it."

So would I, if it were in York. I bet the river, the castle, the Minster and York's higgledy-piggledy roofscape seen from that height would look fantastic.

Planners will meet tomorrow to decide whether World Tourist Attractions should be allowed to bring a wheel almost identical to the one in Birmingham to York's Tower Gardens for 11 months.

What they think of the wheel in Birmingham

Birmingham seems to have taken to its wheel, despite initial reservations.

"It has been very popular," said Tim Manson, the city's head of leisure tourism.

"It is something else to come and see, and it has proved popular with office workers during their lunchtime.

"I live on the 13th floor of a tower block, but you see a lot more of the city from the wheel than I do from my house."

It is also a big hit in the evenings, according to Clare Jepson-Homer of the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, which is on one side of Centenary Square in the wheel's shadow. The wheel is open until 10pm - and that is good news for the theatre. "People come to see a show as well as go on the wheel," Clare said.

There are no figures yet for how many people have taken a spin on the Birmingham wheel since it opened in November. Proof of its popularity, however, is the fact that World Tourist Attractions, who initially planned to operate it in Birmingham for just a few months, have now signed a new contract to keep the wheel in Centenary Square for a year.

Ultimately, Tim Manson says, Birmingham is keen to get its own permanent wheel, although that will be on a different site in the city centre which is still being developed.

So have there been any downsides? In York, people have expressed concerns about possible noise and intrusiveness. After riding the Birmingham wheel - which is virtually identical to the one that would come to York - I can vouch for how quiet it is.

There were initially some concerns expressed by the management of the International Convention Centre (ICC), Tim Manson admits. Their worries about queues for the wheel blocking access to the ICC's conference facilities, however, have proved unfounded.

The wheel is well managed, he says. And when there are queues - as there were at Christmas, for example - there are plenty of other things in Centenary Square for those in the queue to look at while they wait. The Earth From The Air exhibition, for example - a series of giant aerial photographs unconnected with the wheel that takes up much of the centre of the square itself.

And what about being an intrusion? The wheel looks directly onto the Hyatt Regency. Have any customers complained?

None of the hotel's management could be traced to ask. "But I haven't heard of any complaints," a giggly member of staff said. "People see it as a good thing."

Updated: 11:28 Wednesday, March 02, 2005