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#1 ·
Link to the Future Bridgefield Website is below articles and renders.

Bridgefield - Stockport’s Future Unveiled At Exhibition

New exhibition suite opens Wednesday 17th October.

An exhibition designed to encourage public feedback on plans for the £500 million Bridgefield scheme to transform the centre of Stockport opens this week.

The Future Bridgefield Exhibition Suite, at 8 Brown Street, opens its doors for the first time on Wednesday 17 October to showcase how the scheme may look and to gauge public opinion as plans progress.

Developer Lend Lease, working in partnership with Stockport Council, is inviting local residents and businesses to visit the exhibition suite and share their thoughts on the proposed Bridgefield development.

As well as creating 2,000 jobs, the proposed Bridgefield development is expected to include 650,000 sq ft of retail, 80,000 sq ft of leisure and dining outlets, a multi-screen cinema, 250 residential apartments, as well as 1,750 car parking spaces.

Lend Lease Development Director Keith Redshaw commented:

“The opening of the exhibition suite marks the beginning of a formal consultation process taking place before plans are submitted to Stockport Council.

“It’s crucial with a scheme of this size and scope that local people get a chance to view the emerging plans and voice their opinions before we go to the next stage.

“The feedback we receive will be invaluable and will help to shape the final plans as we share our vision for the future of Stockport with as many people as possible.”

The Bridgefield scheme is central to Future Stockport, the council’s vision for the town centre and the site is adjacent to Merseyway Shopping Centre and the M60 motorway. If the development goes ahead, construction would start in 2010 and be completed in 2013.

Councillor Sue Derbyshire, Stockport Counci’s Executive Member for Regeneration, said: "The Bridgefield scheme is at the heart of the Council's masterplan for the town centre, Future Stockport. The development has the potential to change the face of Stockport and make the town centre a real destination in which to live, work and shop. I urge everyone to take a look at the proposals and help influence the future of our town centre."

The Future Bridgefield Exhibition Suite, at 8 Brown Street in Stockport town centre, is open from Wednesday 17 October until 10 November between 10.00 and 16.00 Monday to Saturday with late opening until 19.00 on Thursdays. Visitors can see a 3D model of the proposed development, view information panels and ask for more information. Feedback forms are also available to capture visitor’s comments and suggestions.



£500m town centre developers here to do the real business.
Peter Devine
17/10/2007

A £500 million development in the town centre - involving a land mass the size of 20 football pitches - was launched on Monday.

The Bridgefield development is set to transform the centre of the town and give a new lease of life to Prince’s Street, with up to 650,000 sq ft of retail space, 80,000 sq ft of leisure and dining - including a multi-screen cinema - 250 residential apartments and 1,750 car parking spaces.

It is claimed the development will also help create up to 2,000 permanent jobs

The launch was attended by Stockport Council leader, Councillor Dave Goddard, planning officials and the representatives from the authority's preferred developer, Lend Lease.

The event also included an exhibition at 8 Brown Street, which is currently open to members of the public to give their opinion on the massive development.

Keith Redshaw, Lend Lease development director, said the finance was in place to get the scheme on site by 2010, with work set to be completed by 2013.

Mr Redshaw said: "We think that this is so important to show that we have a presence in Stockport. We are here to do business and we mean business.

"It's crucial with a scheme of this size and scope that local people get a chance to view the emerging plans and voice their opinions before we go to the next stage. The feedback we receive will be invaluable and will help shape the final plan as we share our vision for the future of Stockport with as many people as possible."

Coun Goddard said the plan was going to be the largest development for more than half a century adding: "People will be able to look at the drawings, plans and model and see what is happening in the town, and the difference it will make to Stockport."

Councillor Sue Derbyshire, the executive member for regeneration, said: "The Bridgefield scheme is at the heart of the council's masterplan for the town centre, Future Stockport. The development has the potential to change the face of Stockport and make the town centre a real destination in which to live, work and shop. I urge everyone to take a look at the proposals and help influence the future of our town."


The exhibition is open until November 10 between 10am and 4pm, Monday to Saturday, with a late opening until 7pm on Thursdays at 8, Brown Street


http://www.futurebridgefield.co.uk/flash/welcome.html
 
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#278 · (Edited)
It seems my post came here as a relevation to some or perhaps people may be wearing rose tinted spectacles on here.

I went to Stockport 3 years ago as I had a meeting there in a local firm. I had a wander round this plug hole (Stockport) and was surprised. Given the towns nearby, cheadle, didsbury, wilmslow etc... you would expect that Stockport would be decent at best. It was not.

Let start with the marvel of 1960's Stockport council planning, the Mersey now a precinct resulting in a fascinating study of not only architectural crap but also the biological evolution of it's inhabitants.


These inhabitants seem to role out of bed at 11am, take the latest in modern transport, the 192 to congregate with their fellow peers as if this was a fishing expedition in the river Ganges. Amongst them, there were females, I presume, but it was hard to distinguish. Now I do not expect Stopfordians to look like Naomi Campbell or Gigi Hadid but these were orange potatoes that bob up and down like grizzly raccoons. From what I could decipher amongst their howls, were obscenities and regular mating tactics that would only require a telling off from the jezzmeister.

But to show that I am unbiased and a mere neutral observer, I have found a picture fitting enough to describe the state of Stockport.

http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/2074422

I do believe we should be honest there, we can't keep flogging a dead horse and beautify it. We have no alternative but to demolish every last brick of Stockport and replace it with a motorway.

In regards to Stretford, I merely proposed we build a car park to allow the local populace to use public transport to get to and from the city centre. Further, there is no use for the local precinct given that there is a tesco 2 minutes away.

I stand by my comments in regards to Eccles but I did compliment the church. However the M602 is busy in peak times so an extension would alleviate traffic and extinguish the misery that Eccles seem to be suffering from.
 
#279 ·
Amongst them, there were females, I premuse, but it was hard to distinguish. Now I do not expect Stopfordians to look like Naomi Campbell or Gigi Hadid but these were orange potatoes that bob up and down like grizzly raccoons. From what I could decipher amongst their howls, were obscenities and regular mating tactics that would only require a telling off from the jezzmeister.
Or looking like Sarah Harding, Michelle Keegan, Joanne Whalley-Kilmer or Tess Daly?

Help is available via the NHS for your 'issues'.

:crazy: :troll:
 
#285 ·
You seen Stockport recently? Most of grand central is gone, a lot of construction by the rail station, not to mention red rock, it has had criminal under investment for years but it's finally getting something. i think everyone should follow the life rule that you should only say something if it's beneficial or constructive, your comment was neither.
 
#287 ·
Although he's clearly trolling, Nosey has got the thread going.........hmmmm.

Stockport...I reckon it is the most disappointing place in GM. Disappointing? Well yes mainly because it has sooooo much potential to be a really great place. If you avoid the nasty Merseyway thing, which really does need flattening, then you are left with some potentially really special places like the Underbanks and the Market Place. Trouble is they feel so under-valued and under-populated. The council have let it slide away into an anti-social underclass destination. Those apartments that have been built in the centre are somewhere south of entry level and do no favours to the sheer intrigue of the place with all those dramatic level changes and cobbled history steeped ginnels. It could be so special.
Stockport Town Centre is also where the world famous River Mersey is born. Trouble is the idiots who were in charge in the 1960s thought it would be much cleverer to put it in a concrete culvert rather than clean up the noxious effluents that polluted it at the time and turn it into a tourist destination.
Seriously open your eyes Nosey and imagine what it could be.
 
#289 ·
Merseyway does NOT need flattening. It's pretty much always packed and is well designed.

Back to Jones The Planner (I'm with Nairn)

http://www.jonestheplanner.co.uk/2015/05/stockport-cheshire.html
although the Merseyway Centre is dull towards the Square, Ian Nairn with typical iconoclastic insight admired the way it was ‘plugged in’ to the streets around, and how well the vertical circulation worked. Designed by Bernard Engle in 1965 it has subsequently been extended, partly roofed over and generally dumbed down with superfluous tat supposedly to jolly it up, but you can still see why Nairn appreciated it.

The precinct was slotted in between the older streets, which largely retain their traditional buildings, and so it seems part of the wider town. Many elements of the original design were handled well: the lift and stair tower is an elegant campanile, the car park façade is interestingly modelled, the car park access bridges evoke the Stockport tradition of bridges and positively enhance the townscape. Even the service entrances are composed to provide interest to the street scene and are not just some yawning hole the architect has given up on. Originally the larger stores had entrances onto both the precinct and the street but many of the street entrances and shop windows have been closed, which would disappoint Nairn. This is especially unfortunate for the inter-war Baroque department store on Chestergate with its terracota, nice iron work and clock tower, now standing forlornly idle. The principles of integrating new with old can also be seen in later retail development along Warren Street, this time in that crude, quasi-industrial vernacular of loud brick, but although the details are poor the overall attempt to recreate a traditional street is reasonably successful, at least until it morphs into a giant ASDA with a brain dead retail park beyond. Some buildings are used to bridge the changes of levels between streets so you can take the escalator through Sports Direct and emerge in the Market Place above.
BTW: You can't blame the ever-amorphous '60's idiot planners' for The Mersey being covered over. It was a highway from the 1930's...
 
#294 ·
Merseyway does NOT need flattening.
Seriously it does. Like it or not, Merseyway defines the place to people like Nosey. It shouldn't.

Back to Jones The Planner (I'm with Nairn)
But that's just his personal opinion, Doesn't mean he's right.


You can't blame the ever-amorphous '60's idiot planners' for The Mersey being covered over. It was a highway from the 1930's...
Yes I think we can, the river was only finally culverted in the 1960s Merseyway disaster. Granted, mistakes with highways in too close a proximity were made as early as the 1930s but Merseyway only compounded the felony.
 
#293 ·
Stockport centre is kinda sad place though we all have to admit. Great potential sure but it is kinda crappy currently. Which is weird considering some of Manchester's most affluent areas are so close e.g. Didsbury, Cheadle, Bramhall, the Heatons and Hazel Grove.

Personally I think because Stockport college is so low brow, the centre is awkward to drive around, all the shops are aimed at a low end market and Reddish & Brinnington are crappy.
 
#295 ·
Just another thought....

Places like Stockport flourished at the expense of central Manchester in the bad old days. Manchester as the regional centre fell apart in the second half of the 20th Century. This created the conditions for the middle-class wealth of the region to head to places like Stockport and similar 'burbs.

Happily Manchester core has re-invented itself and has prospered, sucking wealth back from whence it came. Stockport and other similar GM centres need to re-adjust and re-invent to this new reality. Stockport has a better chance than most with it's place on the WCML and uber proximity to Manchester Airport.
It just needs to work out what and how.
 
#303 ·
You probably have a nice beautiful house and I do not doubt this. It probably is in the suburbs with manicured lawns. That is great and I am genuinely pleased for you. Anyhow, what has your house got to do with any of this?

I am likeable and pleasant so I am not sure why you are disputing this.

Retract what? I never said anything offensive or derogatory. I have remained neutral thus far on this thread; something that many others users have picked up on and praised me for on here. Consider me as Ban Ki Moon.
 
#305 ·
Nosey No completely wrong
Maxants I had thought of going to take some photos of station area but weather
is lousey and tomorrow I am busy so it will have to wait
There does seem to be quite a few thing happening, the land next to the Midland
pub on the A6 has been cleared ready for the new road to go through down to the viaduct
also work has been done to tidy up King St West which I guess is also to do with the new road which should be started early next year
The Red Rock other than work is progressing I cannot tell you to much as I have only
been up the A6 about 2 weeks ago.
The Holiday Inn at the station is going up quite quickly and there is plenty of steelwork up
 
#307 · (Edited)
I don't know if nosey is just trying to rile people or look clever with a "controversial" opinion, but the funny thing is in my experience the first people to talk down Stockport are the people who live there themselves. This is old news. They will gladly bemoan the state of the town centre more than anyone, and it has been that way for about 15 years, since Manchester had its resurgence and while Stockport has seemingly stood still. (In fact I wonder if this lack of civic pride and support for the town centre is part of the reason for its continued floundering. Things like the Old Town campaign seem to be winning back visitors, but it's an uphill struggle to change opinions.)

So not only is this opinion completely uncontroversial, it's about 15 years late... and actually I'd say comes just as the town centre might finally be about to really drag itself forward. The Stockport Exchange plans around the station, the new Redrock cinema and restaurants and the bus interchange (itself 15 years late by the time it finally happens - why has this taken since at least 2002??!) are three very visible, genuinely transformative and desperately needed projects that might just finally push the town forward and out of the doldrums. If the council finally got its arse in gear and decided on a definitive plan for trams sometime this decade it would be the cherry on top, but I don't hold my breath...

About the Mersey: a small piece next to Lancashire Bridge was actually opened up this year and has made the world of difference to that small area (pound and loan shops aside)... https://www.flickr.com/photos/allengleave/17899505248/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/allengleave/20181744876/in/album-1644139/

And here's the office building going up at Stockport Exchange (not my photos): https://www.flickr.com/photos/allengleave/22819930724/in/photostream/
 
#309 ·
Metropacer
I think that building is the Holiday Inn which will be the nearest to the station and is due
to open late next year but maybe running a tad late.
One big problem linking the town together is the rail station through the bus station and the town centre is their geographical position which does not lend itself to ease
of connections.
 
#310 ·
As mentioned in the Fantasy lines thread, provision for a future metrolink line has been made in plans to develop Gorsey bank in Cheadle Heath as a new work area, comprising a combination of General Industrial (B2) and Storage and Distribution (B8) with ancillary Office (B1) uses along with associated car parking, landscaping and infrastructure.Planning documents are available here.
 
#313 · (Edited)
There is actually loads going on at the moment...
Bridgefield/Red Rock is a building site
Gt Egerton Street is now dual carriageway - albeit half reserved for flaming buses
Exchange is a building site, Hotel is going up
St Mary's Way is being dug up for widening
They found a Windmill under Hollingdrakes next to the Town Hall - yes, a Windmill!
Work is starting at the bottom of Travis Brow which I presume is linked to the new A6 Access Road
And the A6MARR is progressing nicely:-
- the current end in Bramhall is being dug out for the underpass
- widening works around the A34 junction are in full swing
- there's a big steel bridge taking shape on Simpsons Corner - looks like it will be the one carrying the railway over the A555 behind Simpsons just before the A6 end of the road

The Mobile Tram Cam Mk2 is now 'FULLY OPERATIONAL' so I will endeavour to capture some footage over the next few weeks - I had an aborted run yesterday with the camera pointing mostly at my bonnet so no interesting stuff captured :-(
 
#314 ·
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