Manchester buys strategic Ardwick site
The city council has acquired the Nicholls Campus on Hyde Road from LTE Group as part of plans to regenerate the area.
While the eight-acre campus forms part of the city council’s long term development plan for Ardwick, in the short to medium term it will remain as a college. LTE Group closed the campus in 2022 but the city council has confirmed it will reopen in September.
A Manchester City Council spokesperson said: “We have worked in collaboration with the LTE Group and Manchester College to acquire the strategic Nicholls Campus site in Ardwick as part of the Ardwick Green development framework.
“This framework sets out an ambitious vision for the regeneration of the neighbourhood in the coming years.”
The spokesperson added: “Acquiring the site has ensured that the LTE Group will continue to provide additional and much-needed post-16 education in the community in the years to come.”
The Nicholls Campus was added into the scope of the Ardwick Neighbourhood Development Framework in 2021. A council report at that time stated that the site was earmarked for “significant redevelopment” once vacant.
LTE Group appointed Cushman & Wakefield to find a buyer for the site’s long leasehold last year as part of the ongoing consolidation of its estate.
LTE has already sold the 18-acre Northenden Campus to Miller Homes, its Moston complex to One Manchester, the 6.5-acre Fielden Campus to the Manchester Islamic Education Trust, and its St John’s Campus on the edge of Spinningfields to HBD.
The first phase of LTE’s new £54m Manchester city centre campus on Great Ducie Street is up and running with phase two under construction.
