City of Wolverhampton Council has revealed a competitive field of developers has been whittled down to a strong shortlist of three bidders for one of the largest city centre residential development opportunities in the Midlands.
The news on the Canalside South scheme, which will see hundreds of new homes built along one of the most historic stretches of canal in the country, comes following an open market tendering process alongside partners Canal & River Trust.
Best and final offers for the site will now be submitted by the final trio, who all boast a proven track record to take on what will be a game-changing residential development offer for the city.
The 17-acre waterfront development opportunity sits on the eastern edge of the city centre and is made up of the Canal & River Trust-owned former Crane Foundry site and the Council’s former British Steel site and land off Qualcast Road – all brought together under a collaboration agreement designed to ensure a comprehensive development takes place.
The vision for the Canalside South masterplan is the delivery of around 1,000 homes to meet both the city and wider region’s housing needs, with sustainability and place-making at its heart. There is also the potential to include the provision of a mix of complementary retail, leisure and commercial uses as part of the comprehensive development of the site.
This comes on the back of the first phase of Canalside South, at Horseley Fields, recently receiving planning consent for the first tranche of 366 new homes.
Canalside South is located minutes away from the city centre and the award-winning £150million transport Interchange, providing easy access to the tram, road, rail and canal network.
Commercial partners Avison Young are supporting the marketing of the site.
City of Wolverhampton Council Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for City Economy, Councillor Stephen Simkins, said: “The tendering process demonstrated there is a strong developer appetite to deliver a transformational project in this part of the city.
“We now have three strong bidders for this large and exciting opportunity at Canalside South and, through our Canalside Delivery Partnership with the Canal & River Trust, we are determined to realise its potential.
“Strong partnership working is delivering £4.4billion of investment across Wolverhampton - and by pooling our resources with the Canal & River Trust we believe we can bring about a nationally significant development on one of the most historic stretches of canal in the country.
“It will enable our residents to benefit from superb connectivity, amenity and health and well-being opportunities at this wonderful heritage location.”
Cheryl Blount- Powell, National Property Development Manager at the Canal & River Trust, added: “We have been impressed with the level of interest and quality of developers keen to deliver a high quality sustainable residential led development. The Canal & River Trust look forward to working with the preferred developer to deliver a transformational development for Canalside that the City of Wolverhampton will be proud of.”
Mark Birks, Principal of Avison Young and Head of the Regional Land and Development Team, said: “We have been very encouraged by the commercial appetite for this significant regeneration opportunity within the heart of Wolverhampton. The quantum of interest and the efforts of each of the bidders speak for the quality of the site and offer a great benchmark for similar opportunities across the city core. The interest in this opportunity illustrates the anticipated evolution of Wolverhampton and the scale of ambition of future residential plans.”
Image captions: Computer generated images of what Canalside South could look like
