Work on £200m St Michael’s scheme set to start this summer

Work on Gary Neville’s £200m St Michael’s scheme in Manchester city centre looks set to start later this year following a series of delays.

Work on the project, which include a 40-storey tower block, new five star hotel and shops is due to start this summer.

The project, which has the backing of Gary Neville and Ryan Giggs, has been delayed by planning disputes and questions over funding but is expected to be completed by 2023.

Slight changes to the scheme have been submitted to the city council and Laing O’Rourke has now been officially announced as construction partner on the project with the start-on-site date set for late summer 2020.

The scheme will include more than 163,000 sq. ft. of office space, 22,722 sq. ft. of leisure space – including an outdoor rooftop terrace – and a boutique five-star hotel in the former Bootle Street police station, which will retain its original facade.

The next stage of the detailed design process has been completed by the team and Laing O’Rourke has been part of the process, supporting the design, quality, form and function set out in the planning consent.

This has been successfully achieved and the project team behind St Michael’s is now taking forward the final phase of detailed design and procurement.

A number of relatively minor improvements to the original scheme have been identified; these represent design, functional and operational improvements.

Gary Neville, on behalf of the St Michael’s Partnership, said: “We’re delighted to officially announce Laing O’Rourke as construction partner on St Michael’s.

“The level of input given by them and the team really puts us in a good position to progress swiftly with the final stage of design early in 2020.”

Stephen Hodder MBE, Chairman of Hodder + Partners, said: “I’m pleased that the design development supports the original consented scheme. It was so important to us that during this stage the team maintained the quality, scale and volume of the consented plans, which we have successfully achieved.”

Céire O’Rourke, Laing O’Rourke Director, said: “We are delighted to have been appointed by St Michael’s Partnership to deliver what will become a landmark development in Manchester’s city centre. We will be using modern methods of construction with a high percentage of the development being manufactured off site and assembled on site. These methods, known as Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) minimise disruption, vital in such a tightly constrained site and give the client more certainty in terms of the programme timetable.

“Our established Manchester team; some of whom have been responsible for delivering projects across the city including the Central Library and Town Hall extension refurbishment, Manchester Metrolink and The Henry Royce Institute look forward to starting on site this year.”

It is estimated that St Michael’s will create 1,800 jobs during operation and a further 500 jobs during the construction period.