Why workplace strategy can’t wait

Rowdy objectors, ineffectual chairing, and member intransigence over Grey Belt changes are just some of the frustrations applications can face once they reach the debating chamber. Place North West asked the market: what’s wrong with planning committees and how do we fix them?

The city council’s cabinet has rubber-stamped policy commitments on bringing empty homes back into use and improving rental sector conditions, as well as extending its programme of freehold sales.

Having collaborated on numerous regeneration schemes from Coventry to Chester, the firms have formalised their partnership with the French construction giant buying the Liverpool-based developer.

Bringing the entire building into active and viable use as part of the St Michael’s development is front and centre of the historic Sir Ralph Abercromby pub’s proposed refurbishment.

Permission has been given for two of three planning applications, meaning Peel Waters can progress the Mobil building’s redevelopment and the extension of Greenway, a £1.7m package.

Proposals for community pitches close to Bloomfield Road stadium have been lodged, as the council looks to put Town Deal funding to work.

Once intended as a new home for Birkenhead Market, Wirral Council has now decided that part of the cleared Grange Road plot will be used to support ongoing regeneration projects.

Manchester City Council’s planning committee took little time to wave through plans to relocate Moston Superstore to enable the district’s regeneration, also greenlighting the replacement of two Tib Street buildings.

Billed as Rose Studios, the 103-bed project has been designed by Enhanced Architecture for SW Properties.

Senior figures from politics, local government and regeneration have lined up to pay tribute to “an exemplary public servant” following the passing of the former chief executive of Greater Manchester Combined Authority.

A Liverpool City Council sub-committee will next week be asked to sign off an allocation of £2.47m to support delivery of landscaped space at the long-awaited commercial development.

The chair of Homes England and the chief executive of the newly launched National Housing Bank sat down with Place to to outline how £16bn of public funding will be mobilised to unlock housing delivery at scale.

Seen as an enabler of the North Manchester district’s £25m regeneration, a new home for Moston Superstore is in line for the go-ahead, along with Little Peter Street townhouses and a commercial block on Tib Street.

With a planning application expected this summer for a 1,200-home neighbourhood, PP O’Connor has started to bring down buildings at Greater Manchester Police’s former base in Old Trafford.

Leaving MIPIM behind for another year, the focus now moves on to how those conversations in Cannes translate into real projects back home, says Steven Gregory, area director of Morgan Sindall Construction.

Contractor JF Hunt has begun a £15m programme to prepare the way for the Newton-le-Willows project’s 800,000 sq ft first stage.

Knowsley Council’s cabinet has signed off funding of £600,000, enabling the developer to work up detailed plans for the next phase of the town centre’s regeneration.

Warned by planning inspectors that their draft plan may be unsound, Chorley, Preston, and South Ribble councils have stressed their desire to make changes and seek adoption for the document as soon as possible.

Almost £90m for the Carrington Relief Road, £70m for a potentially Ryder Cup-clinching highway, and £60m for a new Metrolink station in North Manchester are among the projects given a significant equity boost.