£90m Trafford BTR plans lodged

Beech Holdings has submitted a proposal that would see the former multi-storey car park at 499 Chester Road knocked down and replaced with a 309-apartment scheme.

The £90m Trafford BTR scheme has been designed by AHR Architects and features 149 one-bedroom apartments and 133 with two bedrooms within 16- and six-storey blocks

Beech’s scheme also features six one-bed townhouses and 21 three-bed townhouses.

None of the homes will be available on affordable tenures. A viability assessment conducted by Roger Hannah states that the provision of 10% affordable homes would render the scheme unviable.

The project has a gross development value of £91m and will cost £60.7m to build, according to the viability assessment.

Plans for the site have been in the works for some time. The first iteration of the scheme, comprising 360 homes, emerged in 2023 and was subsequently scaled back.

The scheme is Beech’s third project in the area. The developer acquired the 100,000 sq ft Westpoint office building from Marcol in 2016, which it converted into 317 co-living-style apartments.

The project was one of the largest in a wave of office-to-resi conversions in the area.

Beech also owns and operates Academy Apartments on Warwick Road.

Paul Butler Associates is advising Beech on planning. The project team also features Hydrock, Cumming Group, Exterior Architecture, SGI Consulting, Jensen Hughes, and Harris Infrastructure Advisory.

To learn more about the project, search for reference number 115029/FUL/24 on Trafford Council’s planning portal.