Distance: 3.5 miles

Difficulty of the terrain: medium

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

Walk from Bartley Green to Frankley via the summit of Frankley Beeches.

The Story

Route Notes

Getting Back

Iconic in its Isolation

Frankley Beeches is a highly prominent hilltop situated just east of the M5 and roughly equidistant in the rural, greenbelt protected gap, between the southwest Birmingham suburbs of Bartley Green and Frankley.

Lying just inside Worcestershire the hill stands 256 metres above sea level. Substantial by the standards of this part of the Midlands. It is part of the Midlands Watershed Ridge, the high ground which runs through the far west of West Midlands county and across northern Worcestershire, providing the most vivid expression of the divide between the catchment areas of the Severn and the Trent.

From Frankley Beeches on a clear day it is possible to see as far south as the Cotswolds, in an easterly direction towards high ground in Leicestershire, and as far north west as the Berwyn Range in Wales. There are also spectacular views across the north Worcestershire hills including Clent, as well as Birmingham and into the Black Country as far as Turner’s Hill and the Rowley Range, the highest points inside West Midlands county.

Frankley Beeches has been owned and managed by the National Trust for nearly a century since 1930 having been gifted to the charity by the chocolatemaker Cadbury in memory of George Cadbury and his brother Richard. Perportedly you can see the top of their Bournville factory from the hill’s summit. Along with other industrialists in the city George Cadbury was concerned about the rapid expansion of Birmingham into the surrounding countryside during the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. An expansion which was driven in no small part by the commercial activities of Cadbury and his peers, not least the construction of his new factory at Birmingham. But either way, the creation of the long belt of public and quasi-publicly owned greenspace along the watershed ridge that now defines Birmingham’s southern edge, including the Lickey Hills, Waseley Hills and Frankley Beeches itself, dates from this time. An early, paternalistic attempt to create a greenbelt, and confine Birmingham largely within the catchment area of the River Trent.

Route Notes

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the gpx. from Dropbox

I create the Walk Midlands routes via Ordnance Survey Maps Explorer enabling me to take them on my phone. Subscribe yourself via the banner above.

This walk from Bartley Green to Frankley via the summit of Frankley Beeches begins from the bus stop opposite Newman University.

Upon alighting the bus head along Genners Lane towards a white clad towerblock.

Just beyond the towerblock you come to a roundabout where you turn left. 

Soon you reach another roundabout where you turn left again. Continue straight along the road heading towards the edge of Birmingham.

Immediately after you pass the entrance to Five Ways grammar school on your right there is a footpath running along the back of an estate of 1970s vintage council houses which stand right on the southern edge of the urban area.

Follow this path steadily downhill around the edge of some scrub land into the dell where Bromwich Wood lies.

Continue along the path climbing out of the dell out of Bromwich Wood until you reach a metal stile through a hedgerow out into a field.

Cross the stile and walk straight ahead downhill across the field. You have now left Birmingham and West Midlands county out into Worcestershire. The tree-crowned summit of Frankley Beeches lies prominently in sight slightly to the north of where you are walking. 

On the far side of the first field you find a stile which you cross, heading straight across the large grassy field in front of you. To the left of the field near a farmyard there is a gate leading out onto the road.

Once on the road turn left and walk downhill towards St. Leonard Frankley’s parish church. Take care as you walk as cars travel fast along this road, although visibility is generally good and there are narrow verges.

Upon reaching the church turn right across the church’s car park and past an isolated house heading towards the bottom of a green lane.

Walk up the green lane, which can become incredibly wet during extended rainy periods.

At the top of the green lane, now nearing the summit of Frankley Beeches, you enter an open field which you walk around the edge of heading uphill.

On reaching the top of the field you clamber up a short steep bank onto the side of the road which runs along the top of Frankley Beeches.

Here you can cross the road and enter the woodland.

There is an old trig point on the left hand side of the wood looking towards the Waseley and Lickey Hills.

After having a look around Frankley Beeches wood, pick up the footpath to the right of the trees heading downhill across a field towards Frankley Hill Lane.

Upon reaching Frankley Hill Lane follow the road, taking care as it is fast and can be busy, around past a farm.

Beyond the farm you start to descend towards Frankley. Soon you come to a quiet road off on your right past an old farm converted into housing.

Just beyond this old farm there is a footpath running downhill towards the edge of Frankley.

Follow this path downhill until you reach a boundary ditch which divides the southernmost edge of Birmingham from rural Worcestershire.

Upon reaching the ditch follow the path around to the right.

Presently you reach a bridge over the ditch and then turn left, following a path down towards the first houses inside Frankley.

Soon you head right onto a path which leads to a cul-de-sac. Once amongst the houses turn left and follow the twisting cul-de-sac around until you reach the Bolyen Road, the main road through this part of Frankley. Turn left here and continue until you reach the bus stops.

This is where the walk ends.

Getting Back

From the bus stop on Boleyn Road (at the time of writing in January 2026) the 63 bus ran back towards Birmingham city centre. It goes via the Bristol Road (A38) stopping near stations on the Cross City Line (between Lichfield and Sutton Coldfield via Birmingham city centre to the north and Alvechurch and Bromsgrove to the south) as well as intersecting with the route of the 11 Outer Circle in Selly Oak. The Boleyn Road stop was also served by the far less frequent 202 bus, which ran more or less hourly from early morning until late afternoon, between Bromsgrove and Halesowen.