Manchester council and the Homes & Communities Agency are planning to transform a historic textiles quarter into the UK’s largest private rented housing scheme.
The pair are working up a 3,000-home PRS masterplan for the former Ancoats textile district – double the number of market-rent homes in the UK’s current largest scheme at the former Olympic Athletes’ Village in east London.
As many as eight sites owned by the council and the HCA are proposed for redevelopment in the district on the City fringe. The area was once the heart of the UK’s textile industry and has been a regeneration target for decades.
The Grade II-listed Murray’s Mill is set to make up the 300,000 sq ft locus of the scheme, while two other sites – the Heart of Ancoats and the former Stockbridge Airco site – are cleared for development.
Institutional investment is expected to be sought as well as funds from the government’s £1bn Build to Rent scheme.
New funding models are also under consideration for the scheme, with options including harmonising the public estate in the area in the next City Deal, and extending a new 240-home investment model being piloted by the HCA and Greater ?Manchester Pension Fund.
An OJEU notice will be issued to find developers once the HCA and council have determined the order in which the sites should be brought forward, with possible tie-ins to the Co-op’s and the Urban Splash-led New Islington scheme.
A source said: “The whole arc of the north and east of ?Manchester is getting some heavy investment, but this is the first time we have seen something that is not piecemeal. If they can unlock these sites it would be a game changer.”
The council and HCA took control of the sites following the abolition of the Northwest Regional Development Agency in 2011.
Earlier plans for the district, which stalled during the recession, proposed 1,500 flats and 900,000 sq ft of office space.
GVA is advising.
chris.berkin@estatesgazette.com
