A LAND deal has been completed, paving the way for the development of 284 apartments for private rent in Warrington’s regenerated town centre.
All Saints Living has acquired the site next to Central Station – a former industrial site – and expects to start construction in the autumn, creating a six storey complex with a total development value of £51 million.
The ground floor comprises undercroft parking for 256 cars, retail space – fronting on to Winwick Street – and a small number of residential units – facing onto John Street. The upper five floors contain the majority of the residential units facing on to Winwick Street, John Street, internal courtyards and the station square.
They will be open plan and contemporary in style with 106 having single bedrooms and 178 with two bedrooms.
The foyer will focus on a new station square and provide a sense of place-making, with a better balance of public and private open space. The square is being developed as part of the wider Warrington regeneration.
All Saints Living is a division of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne based High Street Group – a multi-disciplinary operation established 10 years ago and involved in property investment, development finance and financial claims.
Gary Forrest, founder and chairman of The High Street Group, said: “As the build to rent, or private rented sector, continues to grow due to demand for homes outstripping supply, we have taken this opportunity to develop these much needed homes.
“These are all exciting projects which we feel will enhance the towns and cities in which they are developed and I would like to thank all our partners for working so hard to help us make them possible.”
Since 2013 Warrington Council has been driving an £800 million regeneration programme. So far about £450 million worth of development is either built or underway.
The remodelled town centre is wrapped around a pedestrian zone and central station and comprises, retail, residential, commercial and educational facilities as well as public open spaces.
For more information on the All Saints Living project, visit www.allsaintsliving.co.uk/john-street-warrington/
7 Comments
The company make it very much sound like a done deal, which, as far as I can tell it is not.
There does not seem to be a planning application lodged nor existing planning approval and the design hardly looks suitable for a conservation area right next to a listed building.
There is planning permission and I assume they will build on the footings already in place (the development started and then stopped – as can be seen at the side of Mike and Martha’s etc) a few years ago. The number of apartments in the article (284) matches the number on the planning application that was approved – 2007/09937. Planners in Warrington have never considered the impact on a conservation area sadly as can be seen by the buildings they have allowed to be built on the opposite side of the road.
The planning permission granted in 2007 lapsed after 3 years and no new application has been received by WBC to date. I agree that Conservation Areas have not always been respected in the past, although the opposite side of the Winwick Street does not actually fall within one.
Who in their right mind would want to live in one of the noisiest, most polluted parts of a town criticised by WHO for it’s bad air quality? Perhaps these depressing ‘open plan’ (bedsits) are intended to form the student accommodation of the nearby technical college? – Campus Colditz!. Maybe the developers think they will get tenants as there is no alternative? – but there is – another town, another college.
Warrington – soon to be ‘Ugliest ‘City’ Centre in Britain!
Such positivity, many people already enjoy living in the town SHA look at all the lovely new and renovated apartment buildings. If you don’t like them, don’t buy one, I am sure you aren’t the target demographic anyhow. The town is investing in itself and I love what I am seeing, great new ideas and buildings, if all else fails you could ask if you can move into the museum 😉
You may love what you are seeing TOGGER but I certainly don’t, what I see is our town centre being destroyed.
We obviously hold very different opinions, but who are we to judge?
Sad though for Warrington that CABE. Chartered Association of Building Engineers – leading body for professionals specialising in the design, construction, evaluation and maintenance of buildings, refused to support Warrington’s town centre regeneration project.
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110118095356/http://www.cabe.org.uk/design-review/times-square
Blimey, i bet you had to blow some dust off that old report. Was CABE’s seal of approval essential or merely nice to have? Do you really think that todays plans are the same as those from at least 12 years ago? As for who are we to judge, that’s a bit rich from someone who constantly tries to pass off negative opinion as fact, especially on anything to do with the towns regeneration and improvement. Look at what is being replaced here and compare it to what we are getting and I hope you can see the vast improvement to the town, after all we can just suspend everything in aspic. People like you though will probably always exist, sniping from the shadows, enjoy.