Bids sought for town hall revamp

MANCHESTER City Council has put out a series of design contracts for the revamp of the city’s town hall and central library.

Councillors approved the £165m five-year refurbishment of the town hall complex earlier this year.

The council has now published three tender documents inviting bids for some of the work. One £2.25m contract requires architectural services for work at the town hall extension, the second calls for design services on the Central Library refurbishment and has a value of £1.5m.

The third tender document, worth up to £3.8m, seeks expressions of interest from structural engineers, building services engineers and conservation architects.

The plans unveiled in February include a customer service centre on the ground floor of the town hall extension and the resoration of the Grade II-listed Central Library.

Another element includes a “Mediatheque” facility from the British Film Institute and the collections of the North West Film Archive.