New plans for a 12-storey apartment block close to Arena Central have been brought forward as the renaissance in city centre living continues.

The project could see more than 100 one- and two-bedroom flats developed on a car park in Tennant Street, close to Broad Street and just a few minutes' walk away from where HSBC will base thousands of staff relocating from London.

An outline planning application has been lodged by property consultancy Knight Frank on behalf of Romar Investments, which owns the small car park in front of the Trident House office complex.

Although the exact details of the scheme are still be decided, the project is expected to have ground floor commercial space, space for cycles but no provision for car parking.

Will Jordan, from Knight Frank's UK residential development team in Birmingham, told the Post : "It has been running as a car park for a number of years but, with the way the market is at the moment coupled with the dwindling supply of residential accommodation in the city, Romar Investments asked if we thought this was a good opportunity.

"We definitely do - this site has the potential to house up to 120 apartments and we're also planning some ground floor commercial space, whether that be a shop or a bar.

"The best thing right now is to secure outline permission on the site and then go to the market to try to find developer and I am 100 per cent confident we would be able do that and get a developer interested.

"Our planning team has done a good job preparing the application and I hope we would secure approval."

The project sits very close to other planned developments including a block comprising 128 student bedrooms and a 135-bedroom hotel designed by Birmingham architect Glenn Howells, also in Tennant Street.

There is also the proposed 'Broad Street Tower' containing more than 500 hotel rooms and flats and a hotel above furniture store Lee Longlands, at 224 Broad Street.

Just a short walk away are the new Innside hotel and apartments, known as 'Left Bank', on the corner of Broad Street and Sheepcote Street, the £500 million Paradise development in Chamberlain Square and Park Regis at Five Ways Island.

Mr Jordan added: "There are lots of office developments going up in the area around Broad Street and many positive stories coming out in Birmingham such as the relocation of staff from Deutsche Bank to Brindleyplace and HSBC to Arena Central.

"Where are all those HSBC staff going to live when they come to the city? If we can attract what would be a small percentage of them to Tennant Street then it starts to look like a really good opportunity."