WMCA secures another £33m to regenerate brownfield sites

The West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) has secured a further £33m of government funding to accelerate its brownfield regeneration programme.

After exceeding key targets set by government, the WMCA has received the new funding from the Brownfield Housing Fund (BHF). It is the second tranche of money it has secured through the initiative.

Altogether, £84m in BHF funding has been earmarked by government for the WMCA over a three-year period, with the aim of unlocking 7,500 new homes across the region.

The £33m will be focused on site clearance and remediation of “difficult to deliver” brownfield sites.

The first tranche of £33m funding received in May 2021 is already helping to kick-start homes across the region including at Culwell Street in Wolverhampton.

This next tranche will support a diverse range of housing and regeneration projects – from the restoration and conversion of heritage buildings into new homes in town centres to mixed-use developments around key transport hubs and major brownfield housing projects.

Andy Street, Mayor of the West Midlands and chair of the WMCA, said: “This fresh injection of £33 million from the Brownfield Housing Fund is a huge vote of confidence in the West Midlands and our ability to deliver on our promises.

“Developing homes and creating new communities on brownfield land has been one of the region’s real success stories of recent years, and we will now be able to keep up our momentum thanks to this latest funding.

“By using government cash to clean-up derelict industrial land we’ve helped create thousands of new homes and jobs, whilst also protecting our precious and irreplaceable greenbelt.”