Regeneration: Bolton bruised but unbowed

THE recession may have forced a couple of private sector-led developers in Bolton to rethink plans for specific sites but council bosses still have lofty ambitions including a third bid for city status within 12 years.

“We are one of the busiest towns in Europe and people see us as a city-in-waiting,” said Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council’s director of development and regeneration, Keith Davies.

A new English city is being created in 2012 to market the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and Davies argues that the town is better-placed to win city status than it was in 2002, when it lost out to neighbour Preston.

For instance, it has a much larger population (over 260,000) than many existing cities, including Salford.

“We have the scale in terms of the people and the buildings, and we have a university now,” said Davies. “Notwithstanding the current economic conditions, we feel that city status is more reflective of our position.”

Bids for city status need to be submitted by May 27th and a decision is expected to be made later this year. All bids have been restricted in terms of content and page numbers to prevent councils from overspending, but Davies said that Bolton’s bid virtually writes itself as the council can update previous submissions with work done on a comprehensive branding strategy undertaken around five years ago.

Since then, Bolton has benefited from a substantial amount of prudently-timed, public sector-led regeneration.

For instance, the £90m Learning & Skills Council grant given to fund the relocation of the Bolton Community College and the Sixth Form college was not only one of the largest grants given by the organisation, it was also one of the last prior to having its capital budget frozen.

The new campus opened in September and forms part of Bolton’s Innovation Zone – a £300m development based around the city’s university featuring a campus area and cultural institutions.

Work has also recently began on Bolton One – a new health and fitness area at the University campus which includes an eight-lane, 25-metre pool. A £9m joint venture with NCP has seen a new multi-storey car park has also been built in the zone.

Another publicly-funded project due to start on site next year is the new £48m bus station which will be linked to the train station (which is getting its own £4m refurb) via a pedestrian footbridge to form a new transport interchange.

This will free up the existing bus station site for a mixed-use development which Davies believes could bring in up to £200m of private sector funding into the town via the provision of potential office, retail and residential space.

The council has time on its side regarding the redevelopment of the site, though- public consultation on the bus station’s design has only just completed and work is not expected to complete on the new bus station until 2014.

Davies said that other private sector investment is taking place. At Topham Estates’
Merchants’ Quarter scheme the first of a number of office buildings (No.1 Merchants’ Place) has completed and Seddon Group has begun work on a new £3m Travelodge.

However, at Church Wharf joint developers Ask/Bluemantle are in the process of remodelling their proposed £226m Church Place redevelopment where 360,000 sq ft of Grade A offices, leisure and retail space had been proposed alongside 700 apartments.

The latter element of the scheme is the element that is most likely to be revised as residential values across the region have tumbled. This has also put paid for the time being to a proposed £100m Urban Village of eco-friendly homes along the River Croal.

“That is still part of what we want to do in the future, but we have more immediate priorities for the time being,” said Davies.

This includes building on a retail offer which was improved substantially through the £80m Marketplace covered shopping area opened by Warner three years ago, bringing in 23 high street names including Starbucks and H&M.

“We have a good, strong retail offer in Bolton,” said Davies. “We need to improve that and we’re not complacent about the need to keep improving”.

He said that the market had been an area that has been identified for improvement but added that council chiefs were well aware that it is “an important asset and also part of Bolton’s culture”.

“We want to retain our long term vision for the future and to ensure that what we’re doing in the short term doesn’t compromise that.

“It’s about being more flexible and about finding more opportunities but not compromising the aspirations we have as a whole,” he said.