Everton’s new stadium and work on a ‘New Town’ with 10,000 homes are breathing new life into the Liverpool to Bootle ‘corridor’ – and the area is also re-emerging as an economic and industrial powerhouse. Tony McDonough reports
Liverpool’s northern docklands, stretching from the city centre to Bootle, once teemed with life as thousands of dock workers went about their business.
However, as the 20th century progressed Liverpool’s status as a global port declined and the rapid growth of containerisation brought the curtain down on the era of ports as mass employers.
However, unlike the docklands area to the south of the city (now reborn as the Baltic Triangle creative and digital hub), the streets around the ‘Bootle corridor’ never fell completely silent.
There remained pockets of industry. Today, firms such as scrap dealer S Norton, bulk liquids storage specialist UM Terminals and palm oil importer and refinery SD Guthrie International all thrive in the Regent Road (Dock Road) area.
Although not tied to the port itself, manufacturers such as window and door maker Warwick North West and branded clothing and materials supplier Wild Thang have built their fast-growing operations one street up from the river on Derby Road.
Warwick chief executive Greg Johnson and Wild Thang managing director and founder Andrew Dwerryhouse, have both spoken to LBN about their excitement at multiple developments breathing new life into the Bootle corridor.
In August 2025, Everton FC kicked off their first Premier League campaign at their new £750m stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock in Liverpool Waters. Despite worries over the congestion and public transport the Hill Dickinson Stadium has given the area a massive uplift.
Thousands of new homes are planned, or already being built, both inside Liverpool Waters, where Homes England has injected £55.2m for infrastructure works ahead of the construction of 2,350 new homes.
There was disappointment in October when the Government declined to back plans for a 10,000-home ‘New Town’, pushed by Liverpool and Sefton councils along with the Combined Authority, between Liverpool and Bootle.
However, with the support of Liverpool City Region Housing Associations and institutional backing from Aviva Capital Partners, the first 135 homes in the so-called Liverpool North New Town are set to go ahead. Multiple private developers are also pushing forward with their own projects.
All these new homes, and the stadium, are likely to see a rise in the number of smaller businesses adding to those already operating in the docklands area. In particular, the stadium is likely to encourage investment from leisure and hospitality investors.
But it would also be premature to suggest the area is pivoting away from its traditional status as a hub of industry.
In June 2025, construction firm Winvic achieved practical completion of £36m industrial and logistics complex at Atlantic Park funded by Royal London Asset Management Property. It is on the site of the former Rolls Royce gas turbine factory which closed in 2008.
It comprises four buildings offering floor plates ranging from 43,000 sq ft to 134,000 sq ft. Located within the Liverpool City Region Freeport zone, which offers a number of tax advantages to occupiers, the development also includes charging points for electric vehicles.
Work on phase 2 of Atlantic Park, costing £42m, has already started and will deliver 420,000 sq ft of commercial space across three purpose-built units, ranging in size from 53,750 sq ft to 216,000 sq ft. Completion is expected in summer 2026.
Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram said: “Atlantic Park is a brilliant example of the kind of ambitious, forward-looking development we want to see more of in our region.
“It’s breathing new life into an historic site and helping us build the kind of economy that works for everyone—fairer, greener, and better connected.”
Greg Johnson took over the helm of Warwick North West from his father Brian in 2021 and has set about turbo-charging the company’s growth with structural changes and investments totalling more than £1m, taking annual revenues from £5m to more than £12m.
“Anyone who lives and works in that strip of land between Liverpool and Bootle knows it isn’t as quiet as some people make out – but at times over the years there has been a sense the area had been forgotten,” said Greg.
“But we are not out-of-sight-out-of-mind any more. The pace of change in the past couple of years has been astonishing, initially driven by the Hill Dickinson Stadium build, but now accelerating thanks to several other developments.
“As a window and door supplier to housebuilders, particularly in the affordable homes sector, we are obviously pleased to see plans for thousands of new homes being pushed forward with such vigour.
But for us it is about more than that. We employ more than 120 people at Warwick, many of them drawn from the surrounding areas. We are not just a factory operating in our own silo, we are part of the community and we take that responsibility seriously.
“Businesses in the area know one another and work with each other, it’s one of the things I most enjoy about being based here. There’s a familiarity and a genuine camaraderie between Bootle operators.
“It feels like Bootle is on the threshold of a new beginning and I can’t wait to see these old streets, and the new streets being built, teeming with life once again.”
Andrew Dwerryhouse started Wild Thang in 1996 with a £1,500 Prince’s Trust grant. Today the business is expanding rapidly, having invested more than £2m in the last few years to expand its production facility.
Now supplying blue chip customers such as McDonald’s, Paddy Power, Sony and Formula One with branded materials, Wild Thang has also established operations in the Republic of Ireland and the US.
Andrew and his team have just secured what he has described as one of the biggest milestones in the firm’s industry. Thanks to its commitment to, and investment in, net zero Wild Thang has secured the coveted B Corp status.
He also welcomes the multiple developments taking place in the area and emphasises the need for both new homes and businesses to fully commit to sustainability.
“In the last few weeks we have put out the call to our own supply chain and customer base to fully embrace the sustainability agenda,” Andrew told LBN. “As Steve Rotheram says we must aim for a greener future.
“We are not only proud to be playing our small part in the transformational regeneration of the area and the Liverpool city region green agenda by becoming one of the most sustainable and certified in our industry sector.
“Its good to see that Royal London are fully taking that on board at the Atlantic Park industrial scheme. It has set a target for all of its buildings to be operationally net zero by 2030.
“We have come a long way on a similar journey to have reached carbon neutrality, which was helped by covering our roof with solar panels that now provide a significant percentage of our energy needs.
“I also hope that the thousands of new homes being built will also be net zero and great other businesses such as Warwick continue to thrive and grow.
“Wild Thang has always been proud to have our HQ and production facilities based in the Liverpool to Bootle corridor.
“It is why, despite the disruption of the pandemic, we pushed on with our own plans to invest more than £2m into our operational facilities using local suppliers that help us create what we think is something genuinely world class and one of the most sustainable building of its type not only in the area but across the city region.
“It is an exciting time to be based in this area and we look forward to welcoming lots of new business and residential neighbours.”