Portsmouth City Council has appointed Mace, the global company of delivery consultants and construction experts, to lead a team including regeneration and property experts, Montagu Evans and Vail Williams, to help shape the delivery strategy for the City Centre North project. The scheme is one of the largest city centre regeneration programmes on the south coast of the UK.
Mace will lead the team in working with the Council to prepare a market-informed viability assessment and delivery strategy. Together they will guide the Council’s next steps to progress development of the new city quarter, where the Council has assembled a significant land ownership and secured resolution to grant planning consent.
The residential led mixed-use scheme has potential for up to 2,300 housing units, including affordable housing, and up 10,000 sqm of commercial space. It will transform 13.25 hectares of underutilised brownfield land into a new city quarter with a large central green space.
The plans will include the redevelopment of the former Tricorn and Sainsbury’s sites, which the Council bought to unlock the opportunity for long-term regeneration of the wider area. City Centre North will therefore create numerous benefits, ranging from boosting housing opportunities to growing the regional economy through projected foot traffic to local businesses. The Mace team are due to report to the Council in October.
Cllr Steve Pitt, Leader of Portsmouth City Council said:
“The appointment of this team, led by Mace, demonstrates the hard work going on behind the scenes at the Council to enable the regeneration of the City Centre North area, following approval of the outline planning application.
“This is a complex project with many different landowners and challenges with infrastructure, but this is a vital step which will help us move forward and find potential partners to deliver our vision.”
Cllr Pitt, along with representatives from Portsmouth City Council and the Mace team, will be at UKREiiFF in Leeds from 20-22 May. The event sees the private and public sectors coming together in Leeds to focus on attracting investment and sustainable regeneration. Government ministers are due to attend and anyone who is anyone in the built environment sector will be converging to take part in meetings, conversations and building business relationships.
Portsmouth will be part of the Central South delegation, coordinated by Business South. Their main stage event at UKREiiF will be a panel discussion focusing on Central South – A Region Primed for Investment. Cllr Pitt will be part of panel with the political leaders from Southampton and Basingstoke, and will be joined by Brian Johnson, Chairman of Solent Freeport and Simon Gill, Winchester Office Leader at Arup.
Find out more about Central South’s presence at UKREiiFF here: Central South at UKREiiF | Business South
Find out more about the City Centre North project here: City Centre North – Portsmouth City Centre
The visualisations attached are all artistic impressions of how the first phase of the project could look. Image credit: Portsmouth City Council.
