Next steps for housing on St Helens factory site

Backhouse Developments hopes to start on site later this year to deliver 239 homes off Chester Lane in Marshalls Cross, which once housed the Ibstock Roughdales brickworks.

The developer was granted reserved matters approval for its proposals for the former factory site last month, six years after the scheme received outline permission for up to 243 homes.

Liverpool-based DV Architects designed the scheme, which will create a mixture of detached, semi-detached, and terraced properties in St Helens.

There will be 60 two-, 134 three-, and 45 four-bedroom homes.

Residents of the three- and four-bedroom properties will be provided with two car parking spaces, while those in the two-bedroom homes will have one.

Properties will be delivered on two parcels of land, each with their own access point from Chester Lane. The larger parcel at the top of the site will have two access points.

The former Ibstock Roughdales brick-making factory was demolished following its closure in 2009, leaving the land vacant.

The Planning Studio is the scheme’s planning consultant. SCP is the transport consultant.

Luke Backhouse, chairman at Backhouse Developments, said: “The next move for the site will be to market it to the housing market to which I have already got a great deal of interest in it, so hopefully a deal will be agreed in the coming months and potentially see a start on site before the end of the year.”

To find out more about the plans, search for application number P/2021/0585/RES on St Helens Council’s planning portal.