St Helens gets wheels turning on £43m interchange
The council will meet later this week to approve spending £9m to design the town’s proposed multi-modal transport hub.
St Helens Council is waiting on the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority to sign off a £28.3m grant for the project but that is not expected to happen until later this year.
In a bid to get the wheels turning on the £43m interchange project ahead of grant approval, the council will foot the bill for the design work.
The interchange project is described in a report to the council’s cabinet as “integral to the transformation of St Helens town centre”.
It will provide a “state-of-the-art bus station to meet the long-term future public transport needs and essential facilities for passengers,” the report states.
St Helens Council’s cabinet is also expected to approve the drawdown of £7.4m from the £69.2m pot of funding set aside to deliver the first phase of the town centre regeneration project.
Phase one of the £100m regeneration of St Helens – which is being delivered by ECF – would see the delivery of a 120-bedroom globally branded hotel, 64 Passivhaus homes, 75,000 sq ft of office space, and 11,000 sq ft of modern retail space, along with an overhaul of the public realm.
Contractor VINCI has been selected to deliver phase one, which will see the council-owned Hardshaw Centre demolished.
Prior to formally appointing VINCI this autumn, ECF requires the first slug of funding to forge ahead with the enabling phase. This package of work includes knocking down the Hardshaw Centre.
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By Anonymous
More Bullpowder 🥱
By Anonymous
What does St Helens need a new transport hub for?…is this going to be the same people that had a very modern market place frontage put into place on a roadway that the public had restricted driving access to?.are these the same people that decide that every time that there is a farmers market they have it in front of the church and empty shop frontages instead of the more attractive town hall and surrounding Victorian frontages, not forgetting it’s very costly pedestrianised area ?…..oh yes and let’s not forget that they have also organised for one of the oldest and best public houses in the town to be demolished for this latest debacle…..but hey I’m sure that the very useful “tin needle” statue will be saved , cannot move some days for the throngs of people rushing to see that.
By Anonymous
I would rather see £9 million being spent on filling in pot holes – now that would enhance the towns ‘ multi modal ‘ transport development- rather than designing ( not even building!) a posh bus stop/ station.
I bet the design company isn’t even based in St Helens?
We have empty retail spaces coming out of our ears and yet the plan is to build more ? ??
Similarly wigb office space- how much square footage of empty office space do we already suffer with in the Borough ?
We need to invest in cleaning up the Borough, worst litter and rubbish around the place I have ever known.
By Fat chance
What a waste of money when st Helens town centre is already dead .r
By Robert Trickey
St. Helens Town Centre needs shops, there is nowhere to shop therefore what does a deathbed shopping centre need state of the art transport hub for?
Is the all the new housing to house the influx of migrants into St. Helens? This is a gross waste of money. Money could be better spent on putting the wonderful Central Library back, enticing M&S, Top Shop et al to return to the town centre which us to be an eclectic hub of shops.
By Helen Thompson
Fix your roads first. It’s like a manhole and paint the road signs clear.
By Memoy